Tiny bottles of liquor. One bourbon, one scotch, and a coupon for a free beer at the hotel bar.
I tried to sell some of my tote bags at a garage sale once. It seems everyone in Silicon Valley has a lot of tote bags.
I did get a little backpack once, which was a nice change.
Can’t go wrong with legos… =)
Definitely a bad idea. A lot of people don’t drink. And many people (drinkers and non) don’t really think much of anything that encourages drinking. The OP doesn’t want to create a corporate image of being a bunch of boozers.
This has to be a joke, right?
I was just at a conference where I got a tote bag which was fine since I love them, and a cool tablet case that was adjustable for any size tablet. It had the company’s logo on it. But the best thing I ever got was FOOD (and a tote bag). The company had fudge branded with their logo. It was the only time I’d ever gotten food. It’s not something I’d see every day (it lasted about 30 seconds), but I never forgot! Didn’t have to drag it home, either. I always thought if I had to figure out swag for a conference, I’d do some survival-type care package items in addition to hopefully useful branded items. I like pens since I’m always losing them.
I have a life time supply of tape measures. :rolleyes:
Duh. Also a not very subtle shout out to George Thorogood.
I would go with this. It’s a micro-sdhc reader that fits on the head of a nickle. You can plug it into your laptop and not worry about snapping it off. I use it as a hard drive for my car stereo. A 16 gb memory chip gives me about 6 weeks of continuous music. You’d have to buy them directly in bulk.
We sell lanyards with logos to our exhibitors as a marketing opportunity -they get to have their name printed on the lanyard we give to everyone as a badge. As a gift not so great, because in my area anyhow we are all up to our asses in lanyards.
Never mind buying crap. Just give them the money. They’ll appreciate it more anyway.
- A veteran of many of these things
I assure you that professionals are not going to care about the tiny bit of money they’d get.
The real winner though is to have fun events. Ones I remember fondly are a private dinner in front of the big tank in the Monterey Bay Aquarium (used in ST IV) and a private party at the Air and Space Museum during the Star Wars exhibit - something that was hard to get into and crowded during the day.
At a conference I attend every year, one of the regular presenters hands out custom chocolate bars wrapped in clear plastic, with his logo right on the chocolate. He says he’s had people contact his business just to ask for the chocolate. And he sends it.
Back when mrAru worked for MetLife they arranged a family day at the Museum of Natural History in New York - including parking. Now that was a great idea, parking is seriously expensive for the length of time it takes to really get a good wander around a museum. I would love to do a business dinner at the Monteray Bay Aquarium.
Was the dinner under the whale? I’ve seen them close that area and set tables - a great place for dinner.
I’m a native New Yorker but I’ve never been there except by subway. I didn’t even know they had parking!
We give out tons of stuff at conferences and I also receive truck loads of it, thumb drives etc are boring and people have tons!
OK what we have done and gotten great feedback on, 1TB portable HD, Golf Umbrellas and proper back packs not crappy ones but something from osprey etc with your brand tastefully on it.
My favorite recent ones:
For the gadget geeks:
USB charger for the cigarette lighter outlet in the car. I picked up two of them recently.
Universal USB charging cable (i device, samsung, blackberry, etc. tips)
Mini-first aid kits (a couple of bandaids, and sample packs of aspirin, ibuprofen, stomach stuff)
I always grab the deck of cards that a couple of firms give out.
Flying screeching monkeys are always a hit.
Also hard to get on planes. Though I suppose if the monkeys are big enough you wouldn’t need a plane.
Swag I luke and use:
-A small folding umbrella. Small enough to fit under a car seat or on my computer bag. Very handy! Still have and use mine after 12+ years. Even fits well in an overcoat pocket.
-Gizmo to hold a piece of paper upright next to my computer. I had my phone list there for many years, nice and visible, not buried under crap and with a small footprint. Have it, but have not used it in a while.
-Folding smartphone stand. I use this every day since I got it in the fall. I wanted to get one for my wife, but they were out the next day.
-Cheap cloth grocery bags are useful, but after 1 conference I have enough for a lifetime.
-Laminated business cards turned into luggage tags. Very handy! Then I changed jobs …
Things I think would be cool are:
-Small but bright LED flashlights. I bought one and carry it with me every day.
-Bluetooth keyboard for smartphone. I got a plastic roll-up one (that’s water resistant) for $30. That’s expensive for swag, and may be outdated in the iPad era. I do like mine - much better than the on-screen keyboard.
-Stuff for kids. Maybe.
-Customized game app? Say, “Angry Pills”? No idea of costs, lead time, distribution, etc.
“Sorry, pal, they’re on back-order. But we can get you a volume discount on these Annoy-A-Trons…”
I was going to +1 the USB drives, until I saw this. It doesn’t even have to be a cable; just an AC-to-USB adapter. (It took me a while to find one of these at Fry’s, until I realized they aren’t limited to iPods and wouldn’t be kept with the Apple accessories.)