What is Corporate Promotional Product Distribution?

So, you’re ready to pull the trigger on creating corporate promotional products. What do you do now? What’s the best option for each step of the product distribution process?

Our quick guide will lay out what you can expect and plan for after creating your promo product designs before moving to the distribution process and choosing the best method for your organization’s needs.

It essentially comes down to whether you’ll handle the sourcing, producing, warehousing, packing, and shipping yourself or if you’ll consigning it to a third-party fulfillment partner. Hint: that’s the most cost-effective and time-saving solution.

Stitchi is an excellent solution as a promotional products company that takes your product vision and handles the logistics of sourcing, manufacturing, and scheduling everything, right down to the moment they come out of the box.

Warehousing Promotional Products

Suppose you use a print-on-demand company to produce your promo products or a promotional products company like Stitchi. In that case, you won’t need to worry about storing your corporate promotional products.

Warehousing is only one part of the distribution process — the first step after the products are made — but it requires significant logistical know-how to be successful and functional. The easiest route is trusting pros that do it every day and will take the stress and responsibility out of your hands. It’s also often the most cost-effective solution for promotional product manufacturing and distribution.

If you have room in your warehouse and personnel that understands how the process should work, you’ve probably already skipped ahead through this section. The best bet is for those without warehousing facilities to go with a print-on-demand company, a promotional products company with fulfillment services, or another third party that can handle the ins and outs for you.

Packing Promotional Products

Fancy packaging with a slick logo, note to the recipient, and brightly colored tissue paper, or packing peanuts and brown cardboard? There are many ways you can choose to pack your promotional products, from the elaborate and relatively pricey to plain and efficient.

If you’re looking for ideas on dressing up your packages, which companies often want to do with corporate gifts to favorite clients, you can check out companies like Packola, which offer low rates for large custom packaging orders.

Shipping Promotional Products

Dropping packages off at the post office or having the mailman or UPS guy pick up your packages when he’s in the office typically works fine for many companies that aren’t sending out a semi-trailer full of promotional products.

If you plan to ship out several thousand units or a couple of hundred, your options become more limited. More units require more logistical planning to distribute successfully.

A third-party fulfillment service is your best option for handling promotional product distribution with the least amount of time and resource commitment on your end, including packing and shipping. They know what they’re doing, which usually ends up being more cost-effective in the long run after you factor in the resources you’ll save.

Factors to Consider When Creating a Shipping Strategy

• Shipping Rates and MethodsShipping is never actually “free.” Someone has to pay for it, whether you kick shipping expenses to your promo product recipients via a “free product; just pay shipping” type of strategy, offer a flat rate to absorb some of the cost, or charge a regular shipping fee.

• Product WeightKnowing the weight of each package you need to be shipped helps considerably with strategizing the best delivery method.

• PackagingInvesting in customized branded packaging may be what you’d like to do, but consider how that affects your fulfillment complexity, shipping weight, and how each fits into marketing budgets.

Here are a few shipping options to help you make your decision:

Dropshipping

Dropshipping is a cost-effective solution for getting your products into the hands of your customers and an ideal model for new entrepreneurs without warehouse space. You source your products, have them sent to your drop shipper, and when a customer places an order, the drop shipper sends them the product.

Fulfillment Warehouses

Similar to dropshipping, fulfillment services and warehouses handle the storage and shipping of your promotional products. Because of their large size and numerous customers, fulfillment warehouses are usually relatively inexpensive shipping options with fast shipping times.

A potential downside is that you’ll likely be stuck paying “pick and pack fees” for the use of the fulfillment services. That said, if you haven’t got a warehouse of your own, those fees will be much lower than the cost of starting a warehousing facility from scratch.

Schedule Package Pickups with UPS or DHL

You can also rely on shipping services like UPS or DHL to get your promo products to your recipients’ doors. You can schedule pickups right to your office rather than waiting in line at the storefront.

The downside to this is that you’ll have to store your promo products yourself.

Sourced, Sent, Received

Now that you’ve learned a little more about the options available for distributing corporate promotional products, which option is best for your company’s needs?

Many fulfillment services and promotional products companies, like Stitchi, handle the entire creation, storage, and order fulfillment process, taking the logistical responsibilities out of your hands. This is often the most cost-effective solution and only requires finding one company to work with rather than attempting to integrate multiple service providers.