Electronics Help Companies Stuff Messages in Stockings
Every year at Christmas, hundreds of local corporations distribute holiday gifts to executives and business associates.
One of the best-selling corporate gift items is an electronic memory device that stores names and telephone numbers, said Gerald B. Speen of Creative Gift Services of Van Nuys. Yet Speen conceded that the gadgets serve no more purpose than a pocket phone book.
“The practicality of it escapes me, but that’s OK, everybody wants them,” he said.
But maybe the hottest corporate gift idea in Los Angeles this year, according to Idea Man, a specialty advertising firm, is a calculator that looks like a matchbook. At only $5 apiece, the miniature calculators, imprinted with a company message, are handy stocking stuffers for employees.
Many of the corporate gifts carry subtle messages.
Ties from Unocal in Los Angeles, for example, feature symbols woven into a pattern denoting high points in the oil company’s year, such as a new coal project in Canada or the opening of a research center. This year’s symbol will remain a corporate secret until the gifts are opened.
Forest Lawn one year sent out out alarm clock-calculators that strongly resembled a half-open casket when in use. Mortuary officials strongly deny any macabre meaning was intended.
“It never even occurred to anyone,” said a company spokesman, who nonetheless conceded the similarity. “That really would be a bit beyond us.”
But, symbolic or not, business executives say selecting the right gift is no easy task.
A three-member team at Sunkist Growers in Sherman Oaks pored over dozens of catalogues and sales samples for weeks before they settled on a vinyl notebook portfolio with an oversized calculator.
The portfolios, imprinted with an orange stripe and the company’s logo, are being distributed to 350 clients and business associates--along with boxes of oranges, naturally.
‘All Year Long’
“We wanted to give an item that reminds the recipient of Sunkist all year long,” said Linda Shepler, manager of Sunkist’s Consumer Response Center and a member of the selection committee. In past years, the company has distributed sets of glasses and stadium blankets, also personalized with the company name.
Many companies have several levels of managers who make gift-giving decisions. At Glendale Federal, each department head decides what types of gifts should be distributed and who gets them, a company spokeswoman said. Food baskets and candy are popular this year, the official said.
Advertising specialists also acknowledge that many companies have A-B-C-D lists, allocating different gifts at different price levels, depending on the employee’s rank in the company or the client’s importance. In doing this, however, Speen said companies “run a risk” of upsetting someone who learns he received a less valuable gift.
Sometimes the gifts don’t match the recipients. Glendale Mayor Ginger Bremberg usually receives a poinsettia from Forest Lawn, whereas a baked ham usually is sent to Los Angeles Councilwoman Joy Picus, who is Jewish and gives the ham away.
Although she conceded being a bit miffed by her apparently low position on the list of the hometown mortuary, Bremberg said, “I love my poinsettia plant and look forward to receiving it every year.”
Despite the risks, corporate gift-giving has been a tradition in America for more than a hundred years, according to the Specialty Advertising Assn. International of Irving, Tex., which represents 3,900 specialty firms, including 300 in California.
Specialty Advertising
During the last decade or so, more and more corporations and businesses have turned to specialty advertising firms to help choose promotional gifts.
“Things have changed over the years,” said Todd Singleton of the H. W. Singleton, a Westwood speciality advertising firm founded in 1926. “You can’t just stamp your name on a burlap sack or a calendar. Gifts must be useful, tangible and valuable to the recipient.”
They also should last.
“What has happened is that the quality of gifts has increased,” said Bob Waldorf, president of Idea Man. “Companies want something with durability. They have been flooded over the years with items that don’t work well or don’t work long.”
Most important, gifts should be repeatedly used items, a constant reminder of a company’s good will, specialists say. They concede that the presenting of corporate gifts is rooted in commercialism.
“Most of the gifts that we supply are a vehicle for advertising as well as to say thank you,” Waldorf said.
Speen at Creative Gift Services put it more bluntly. “It may not sound much like the spirit of Christmas, but the fact is that companies operate with the bottom line in mind,” he said.
The real impetus to corporate gift-giving, Speen said, is to build morale and performance among employees, generate greater loyalty from clients and enhance relationships with associates. Speen said he views business gifts “as an investment, not an expense.”
The idea of company gifts is believed to have begun in 1845 when an enterprising insurance agent in upstate New York, unable to get his friends to display his business message, decided instead to attach it to blank calendar pads and present them as gifts.
Calendars Still Popular
Company calendars are still among the most popular gifts, although the percentage of calendar sales has declined in recent years as other more unusual and less expensive items entered the market, according to the specialty advertising trade group.
Rick Ebel, vice president of marketing for the association, said the industry now generates sales of $3 billion a year. And Christmas is the busiest time.
Throughout the United States, clocks, ranging from low-cost digital desk models to more elaborate ones, are a hot-selling item this year “probably because there are so many newer ones and they are always useful,” Ebel said.
Calculators still are high on Christmas lists. “You see calculators on key tags,” Ebel said. “Everybody has forgotten their multiplication tables.” Personally embroidered jackets and company T-shirts and caps are staples as well.
Singleton said designer clothes and quality manufactured goods often are selected by corporate buyers. Company logos are used to create patterns in silk Givenchy ties. Other companies have their logo subtly screened or embroidered on a tiny part of a tie.
“Our society is so geared to symbols,” Singleton said. “People pay good money to buy a Ralph Lauren shirt or a Gucci purse.”
$5 to $25 Range
However, most companies shop for gifts in the $5 to $25 range, specialists say. The maximum tax deduction for business gifts is $25, a figure that has remained unchanged for more than 25 years.
Exceptions may be made for gifts to top company executives, such as the chairman of the board or chief executive officer, Singleton said.
A Mark Cross pigskin leather portfolio, for example, with company logo subtly pressed on the inside pocket of the suede lining, costs about $100. A 14-karat gold Cross pen and pencil set, complete with a die-struck logo, could reach $1,000. The Cross pens ordered most often, however, are priced from $12 to $35.
Commercial messages on the more expensive items usually are discreet.
Despite the October stock market crash, promotional firms in Los Angeles say their industry is booming. “Our business is up 32% through November of this year,” said Waldorf of Idea Man.
But many companies that delayed their gift-giving decisions for one reason or another have created havoc for suppliers in the days before Christmas.
“This is headache time for us,” Speen of Creative Gift Services said.
Take, for example, the shipment of executive pencil sharpeners, individually engraved with personal initials, which arrived last week. “Five came in with the wrong initials and there is no way to get the engraving off,” moaned Speen, who said the sharpeners, designated for one company’s key executives, cost $100 each.
Then there are the gift packs of food from Wisconsin--still sitting in Wisconsin. And several thousand Christmas ornaments emblazoned with a major insurance corporation’s name, all unreadable.
“Right now, there is virtually no selling in this business,” Speen said. “This is problem-solving time.”
