Don’t panic, but your money is going back to the future
The pound coin won’t be round for much longer. How will you cope when the Royal Mint brings in a new twelve-sided currency?
This urgent news may have passed you by, but the pound coin won’t be round for much longer. Money never sleeps and this month, to beat the counter-fitters, the Royal Mint is ditching billions of quids-worth of pound coins and bringing in a new twelve-sided currency.
Good-bye circles and hello dodecagons. We had to check with the boffins at Wikipedia who confirmed that the new shape (“twelve lines of reflective symmetry and rotational symmetry of order 12”), was not actually new at all.
Granny and Grandad will probably remember the Nickel and Brass Thruppney-bit, back in the days when a twelve-side 3p would buy you a copy of the Beano, sweeties and a bus ride home.
On its own the new pound coin won’t buy you any of those things any more, but worse, it won’t open-up the essentials of everyday life. What about all those vital things that need a round pound?
How will we get a trolley at Sainsbury’s? How will we get a locker at the gym or swimming pool?
I know. It’s a future too terrible to even imagine….
But don’t panic, Purple Patch is one step ahead of you already. We can now supply trolley-coin keyrings with your logo or brand, boldly emblazoned on the perfect quid-sized dodecagon.
“But what about the trauma of transition Georgie?!” I hear you cry. “What if the gym lockers take the old ones and Waitrose takes the new? How will we cope?”
Calm down, we can do both old rounders and new twelvers to help ease you through the pain of the change of loose change.
And what a smashing promotional idea that is. Why not send your staff or your customers an old-shaped one now, and a new-shaped one next month? Or both at the same time. It’ll remind them that you not only have your finger on the pulse of vital fiscal affairs (good business vibes), but also it shows that you care about helping them through tricky financial times.
But you need to act now. The twelve-sided time has come. They’ll be here before the end of the month, so give me a call and we can calm the nervous markets and give your clients economic stability.
Below, an old, passe, past-it, but essential round pound trolley coin keyring - still available, for now. Get them before there's a run on the pound.
The most useful antidote to Black Friday.
The most useful antidote to Black Friday
We won’t mention that dark coloured day of shopping madness, and we won’t be encouraging you to buy anything. Instead, here are ten very useful things. Free, gratis, on us.
For work
LastPass securely remembers your passwords, so you don't have to.
Trello. A simple and easy to use project and work management tool.
printwhatyoulike - print precisely what you want from any webpage.
Cold Turkey. If you’re easily distracted while trying work this will block Facebook or cat videos until you finish
How to write the perfect creative brief.
For fun
netflixroulette.net – Find something random to watch on Netflix.
pintsinthesun.co.uk – Find somewhere to drink a pint in the sun.
What3words - Lost somewhere with no address? At a festival, or in a forest? Need to send a parcel to a Mongolian tribesman? This is the simplest way to communicate location.
What should I read next? Enter a favourite book and get great suggestions.
Not sure what to make with the strange leftover stuff in your fridge.
When you are in the mood to buy brilliant promotional goods or branded team clothing, you know who to call.
Zippy swift rush and hurry-up
Pushed for time? In a rush? Boss given you an impossible deadline? Need a gift or a giveaway sooner than pronto? As Douglas Adams also wisely said, “Don’t Panic”. We can help.
“I love deadlines. I love the noise they make as they go whooshing by.” Douglas Adams.
Pushed for time? In a rush? Boss given you an impossible deadline? Need a gift or a giveaway sooner than pronto?
As Douglas Adams also wisely said, “Don’t Panic”. We can help.
Here are half a dozen promotional gift ideas that we can have back to you in five working days. Sign-off the artwork and get us a PO by the end of this week and get your goods by next Friday afternoon.
That’s the just the tip of the product iceberg we can supply, and if you have a little more time the range and options increases exponentially, so don’t delay and give us a call. Now scroll on….
If you have a little more time, or your own idea, we can always help. Please do give me a call.
Georgie
02380 454628
Is advertising useless?
Let’s be honest everyone hates advertising. We believe that we can help you ensure your brand is remembered and recognised better than any digital or print ad.
Let’s be honest everyone hates advertising.
Apart from some funny Carling adverts and sexy Levis commercials in the eighties, we all go out of our way to avoid ads. We fast forward and click skip as quickly as we can. They get in the way and annoy us.
But as business people we have to advertise – not just to let our potential customers know we exist, but also to remind our own customers that we have exactly the right, useful thing for them. Stop reminding all of them and they’ll forget you pretty quickly.
So the logical way to bypass advertising is to make yourself useful. Everyone likes useful things so when marketing budgets are so tight, perhaps you should stop thinking about ads on Facebook (do people really want to see you there?) and look for something that actually helps them.
Ask yourself how much you would pay to put your company’s brand on your customer’s desk? And for it to be used every day.
How much would it be worth if they could hold your brand in their hands every day?
How much would it be worth if they never left the house without your name on their keys or on a warm cup of great coffee?
How much would it be worth if they went jogging in your logoed top or if your gift kept them dry in a winter downpour?
For less than the price of an ad in a magazine that most people will flick straight past without noticing, you could have thousands of useful things that went directly into your customers’ hands.
Nobody really knows how many people really ever see digital ads (this is an interesting read), but you can be sure that an umbrella, a shopping bag, a good pen or a classy key-ring will stay in someone’s hands far, far longer than any newspaper or Twitter post.
There’s a not terribly funny but very relevant joke in marketing that there are four golden rules for guaranteed success.
Brand recognition
Brand recognition
Brand recognition
Brand recognition
We believe that we can help you ensure your brand is remembered and recognised better than any digital or print ad. Spend your valuable marketing budgets wisely and ask us how we can help put your brand on something truly useful.
80 days and counting
Never mind the weather, September is a time of opportunity so here are our top ten autumnal suggestions for keeping your customers and teams toasty and happy.
We’re sorry to break this news to you but there are less than 80 working days until Christmas. The good news is that’s not only enough time for Phileas Fogg to sneak in a quick trip around the world, but also that there’s still plenty of time to think about keeping your people warm and dry this winter.
Yes, sorry (again), we did say winter. September is doing its usual lurch between wet and dry, but it’s definitely darker at supper time and the warm summer evenings of August feel like years ago. The Pumpkins are swelling from green to orange in the Purple Patch patch and before we know it we’ll be rummaging around for woolly scarves and hats.
But don’t panic, it’s a time of opportunity so here are our top ten autumnal suggestions for keeping your customers and teams toasty and happy.
Keep warm
Get ahead and get a hat. Branded fleece or wool beanies are always a very popular way to keep your brand on people’s minds.
When it’s just nippy and a bit damp, a good quality fleece can do the trick too. From sleeveless gilets to Polartec hoodies, we can supply all the top brands or something more cost-effective and workmanlike.
Hugh Furry-Knittingball is on the telly campaigning for Starbucks and Costa to recycle their cups, so keep your customers’ brews piping hot with a reusable coffee cup or a stainless steel travel mug, and everyone can feel like a righteous tree-hugger. Did we mention lovely hot soup? No, well how about a proper Thermos flask then?
A lovely china or enamel mug with your logo on it is also a guaranteed way of keeping your good name in front of your clients. We have all the shapes and all the colours.
Keep dry
Everyone leaves their umbrellas on the train or in the pub, so now is the best time to give out replacements. Discreet handbag (or briefcase) sized collapsible little numbers are life-savers, but a bright colourful golf-style umbrella, big enough for keeping couples dry, will stand-out in any crowd.
If you’re a cyclist there’s nothing more uncomfortable than a wet saddle, but we live in a kingdom of rains, so it’s a fact of a peddler’s life. Bike seats and damp bums go hand in hand (so to speak), but of course we have a bright and brilliant solution [have a look here].
If you need to keep hard working staff dry outdoors this winter let us supply you with some durable hi-viz outerwear, branded foul-weather coats or even safety flotation suits.
So that’s hats, fleeces, coffee cups, mugs, thermoses, umbrellas, saddle covers, hi-viz, foulies and maritime safety suits. Ten tip top ideas.
PS: any of those would make great Christmas gifts for your customers. Less than 80 days….just saying.
Life-savers - a different kind of floater
Life-jackets and buoyancy aids are notoriously difficult to print onto because of the important floaty stuff inside.
To achieve a reasonable degree of permanence, most printing techniques use heat to bond the design to the fabric and neither the internal EPE foam, nor the Gore-tex outer react well to intense heat. Neither do the gas cylinders in inflatable lifejackets. Obviously.
There's no point looking sharp at the bottom of the ocean.
The manufacturer's logo and branding tend to be printed onto the fabric before they're assembled, so printing a good looking design onto the finished product is a bit of a head-scratcher. So without giving away too many of our trade secrets and nifty thinking, we opted for digital-transfers.
A digital transfer is just one way of putting logos, brands and designs onto garments, caps or bags with a minimum amount of heat. The design is printed onto transfer paper, cut out with a plotter, and then placed onto the object. Heat and pressure is then gently applied to ensure that the image adheres permanently to the garment without damage to the fabric.
The client was really happy with the finished result, so if you've got a product or garment that's problematic to print, give us a call.
Plop, plop. Floaters?
Our public service announcement of the day is to save people’s keys and let them lock-up and unlock, with a multifunction keyring and stay remembered.
Keyrings of course.
What were you thinking we meant?
To cut a long story short, we nearly dropped our keys down the loo this morning, but a last-gasp snatch of our floaty keyring saved the day. The buoyancy wasn’t tested this time, but it was a close shave. There’s nothing worse than u-bend fishing first thing in the morning.
Which reminds us to remind you that the very best corporate gifts solve a problem and provide memorable solutions. If a little thingy with your good named emblazoned across it proves the difference between salvation and disaster, they’ll remember you forever.
After dropping your keys into the watery depths, not having a pound coin in your pocket or purse is widely regarded as one of society's most aggravating problems. Whether it's at the Tesco trolley park or for the lockers at the gym or swimming pool, a nifty and beautifully branded trolley-coin-key-ring is one of the most useful things you can put in your pocket. Or handbag.
So our public service announcement of the day is to save people’s keys and let them lock-up and unlock, with a multifunction keyring and stay remembered.
Hope that’s helpful.
PS. Ever dropped your mobile phone down the loo? We can do waterproof mobile phone covers too. Just saying.
The main event
It's the time of the year to get out and say hello to your customers. And when you've said hello how will they remember you? Here's our quick guide to six summer show essentials to make sure that your name stays with them long after the fun has finished.
Are you equipped and ready to meet your customers?
Summertime is event time. From music festivals to county fairs and from regattas to trade shows, it's the time of the year to get out and say hello to your customers. And when you've said hello how will they remember you?
Here's our quick guide to six summer show essentials to make sure that your name stays with them long after the fun has finished.
T-shirts. Do your team need to look sharp, sprightly and summer-fresh? Of course they do. What about your customers, attendees or competitors? Yes, they’ll need a bright, branded reminder too.
Lanyards. It’s good to know who everyone is, where they’re from and which VIP area they’re welcome to visit. Put your logo on a colourful lanyard, add a name badge and everyone at the event will know your good name.
Beach bags. It won’t last long but Summer is the time for getting wet. By the pool or on the beach a waterproof kit bag is a truly useful gift that people will keep and thank you for.
Water bottles. Another ‘keeper’ and another useful tool in your promotional toolbox. Available in in every shape, size and colour you can think of. And then some.
USB sticks. Even in these times of digital convergence, cloud storage and frictionless sharing there’s still a need for a stick with data. People don’t want to lug around heavy catalogues and bundles of sales info so give it to them on a branded mini storage device and everyone will be happy.
Swag bags. If you're selling nice things, your customers will need a nice bag to keep them in and as you’ll be giving them t-shirts and drinks bottles they’ll need something to carry them in. Help them save five pence at the supermarket and they’ll never forget you. Available in every robust fabric and in every size from tiny to huge.
Have a great summer.