To meet evolving customer demands, brands need to be aware of the ever changing trends in marketing and advertising strategy. Today’s consumers are increasingly aware of an interested in global issues, looking to include these in their purchasing decisions. This means that awareness of the biggest issues affecting us worldwide is your first step towards creating relevant and impactful branded merchandise. Let’s have a look at 5 key areas and corresponding options to display your brand message.

Sustainability

Brands everywhere are placing greater emphasis on offering environmentally friendly and
sustainably produced items as part of their merchandise. This can mean working with local
producers, picking products made with organic or ethically sourced materials, and focusing
on reusable, recyclable merchandise.

Rather than reach of the plastic this year, we’re looking at more sustainable promotional
items such as:

• Reusable water bottles: Offer your employees or event attendees custom branded reusable water bottles made from environmentally friendly materials such as stainless steel, aluminium, or biodegradable plastic. Adding your logo to a bottle that’s taken away and carried to lots of other settings helps your brand travel, too!

• Tote bags: Our wide range of customisable tote bags made from sustainable materials such as organic cotton, recycled polyester, or jute, gives you lots to play with. These bags can be used for grocery shopping, beach trips, or as an alternative to single-use plastic bags. They help associate your brand with sustainability and they’re a truly useful item, too.

• Seed paper: Change up the standard office gifts and offer some notepads or greeting cards made from recycled paper which has seeds embedded in it. Your brand’s name can be present on paper that will be planted and develop into new plants – what could be greener?

Customisation

Personalised merchandise is a great way to make your brand stand out, blend into different
settings, and get closer to the end consumer. With the following design options, you can
increase reach and brand awareness.

• Printed t-shirts: Add the logo, designs, or messages of your choice. T-shirts can be personalised with names, numbers, or other details, making them a popular choice for events, employee gifts, or promotional giveaways.

• Keychains: Custom-branded keychains with your logo or design are easy to keep, fun and popular. Keychains can be made from a variety of materials including metal,plastic, or leather and offer lots of personalisation options.

• Phone cases: How about your company name on a phone case? Everyone uses one! Free phone cases are a popular choice for events, employee gifts, or promotional giveaways, and you can never have too many, so they’re always in demand.

Driven by Experiences

Brands are shifting from product-based merchandise to experience-driven merchandise that provide a connection with customers. Invest in some branded products that make a stronger connection with consumers, employees or business partners, and your brand will
be a lot easier to remember.

• Virtual reality headsets: A branded headset provides customers with immersive and interactive experiences. These can be used for events, product demonstrations, or as promotional giveaways.

• Smart speaker: Going beyond just listening to music, voice-activated experiences in
  people’s homes are extremely popular. Offer a custom-branded smart speaker as an
  employee gift or as part of a giveaway.

• Adventure kit: More and more of us are interested in spending time outdoors. Meet this trend with items like backpacks or Swiss army knives, always useful in any setting. Moreover, they encourage outdoor experiences, aligning with the trend of health and wellness below.

Technology Integration

It’s official: technology such as augmented reality, QR codes, and NFTs is here to stay. How
can you make this part of your company promotion? You can start small with power banks
and grow your involvement from there. Here are some quick and easy ideas:

• Power banks: Yes, you can offer a personalised power bank that’s always useful for consumers wherever they are. And you can now go one step further by adding a QR code onto it, linking your gift receiver to a range of experiences. This can be a link to your landing page, to promotional offers, or to immersive activities or games.

• Bluetooth headphones: There are options to enhance your Bluetooth headphone gifts with immersive audio experiences like built-in walkthroughs of your products or simply relaxing music and nature sounds. What better way to unwind and have a positive association with your brand?

• Smart watches: Offering your employees or business partners a personalised smart watch sends a great message around tech integration and your prioritising health and wellness. You can even customise these further, with exclusive content or special offers. And you can create fitness goal leagues or similar health data games to bring the team closer together!

Health and Wellness

The growing popularity of health and wellness products, from exercise kit to accessories and including relaxation items, opens up endless opportunities for branded merchandise in 2023.Having these on your list of corporate gifts is ideal for associating your brand with health and wellbeing and for demonstrating your commitment to workplace wellness, too.

• Yoga mats: Custom-branded mats bring your brand logo wherever someone exercises. You can use these as part of an event where a yoga session is offered (as a free gift), or you can offer them to everyone at the office (store them in an empty room and set up a weekly yoga session?)

• Essential oil diffusers: Promote better stress management and relaxation after work by offering a branded essential oil diffuser. They improve air quality, enhance your mood, and can provide a fantastic escapist experience, aligning them with the trend for experience-driven products.

• Reusable face masks: Since the pandemic, we’ve come to appreciate the role of face masks as barriers to promote your own hygiene and health and protect those around us. Now you can personalise and offer face masks that protect wearers against dust and pollution, or that can be used when they’re feeling under theweather to keep their condition from spreading.

To stay abreast of the newest marketing trends and find out more about our branded
merchandise options, follow us on LinkedIn!