Long after a potential customer meets you and months after the annual meeting or the employee motivation program, people will remember your company and the event whenever they use or see the item they received then. A 1997 industry survey found that 95% of business executives have in their offices at least one promotional product with another business' logo on it.

That's a lot of staying power and it's one reason that promotional products are increasingly used by businesses. In 1998 sales in the promotional products industry grew to $13 billion from 11.9 billion in 1997. Promotional products encourage, inspire and remind while advertising and/or promoting a company and its message. And businesses are using them for that and more.

Promotional products are used mostly as business gifts. The 1998-99 State of the Industry Survey, conducted by The Counselor® magazine, the news magazine for promotional marketing and specialty advertising management, found that business gifts were the Number 1 use of promotional products.