Logo'd USB Drives - 6 Things To Know Before You Buy

USB drives, (also known as "thumb drives," "memory sticks," and "flash drives") are a staple promotional item that every company should have in the cupboard. It's easy to see why: they're useful and that means they'll be retained, they're inexpensive, and they offer multiple opportunities for branding.

You can use them to reply to RFPs, as a way to present information about an event (schedules, venues, etc.), speaker bios, insurance policy benefits, the list goes on and you get the idea.

BUT...they are not all created equal and it's easy to get taken if you just go for the lowest price.

Here's what you need to know before you buy.

The most important aspect of the drive is what is know as its memory classification (not the memory capacity, I'll get to that later).

Memory classification is designated by "Tiers" with Tier 1 Memory being the best and Tier 3 being the least reliable. The little chips at the heart of your USB drive were cut from a master silicon wafer.

Master silicon wafer

The chips cut from the middle are stronger, have the longest lifespan (about 10 years), have zero to extremely low error rates and are faster. These are Tier 1 chips. They often have a serial number or name etched on each chip.They have a lifetime warranty.They are unused and go straight to the USB drive maker. (More on that later)





Here's what the guts of your USB drive looks like.....





Tier 2 chips are cut a bit further away from the center. They are reliable, although not as reliable as Tier 1.
They will not have a manufacturer's name or a serial number. They're a bit slower and won't last quite as long. They will not have a lifetime warranty.

Tier 3 chips are cut from the edge of the master wafer. They can have failure rates up to about 40%. They do not have any warranty.

Here's a little secret about low cost USB drives; they are most likely either Tier 3 or they've been scrubbed and are being reused. It happens. That's why you're likely to see a 1GB drive from one source for $12 each and the same capacity from another source for $6 each. Rest assured, the first drive is Tier 1 and the other is probably Tier 3.  Your promo products vendor can tell you if you are getting a Tier 1 drive and you should insist on documentation that you're getting Tier 1 and a lifetime warranty.

As the old saying goes, "You get what you pay for."

Here's the next thing you need to know; chips are sold as commodities. The price will fluctuate from week to week. Most suppliers post their prices on Monday's and hold those prices throughout the week. They re post the following Monday. Right now (September 2014) chip prices are at all time lows.
When Apple was manufacturing the iPhone5 prices jumped because Apple was buying all the supply they could.

Next, memory capacity has expanded significantly over the past few years. Most suppliers offer drives with 64 GB of capacity. The most popular capacities are 1GB and 2 GB. See if you can find a 32 mg or 64 mg drive...even 128mg are getting scarce.

The most popular (and practical) style is the "Swing" (also called a swivel ) drive, so named because of the arm that swings away to give access to the drive. (It's practical because there is no cap to lose).

You see they come in a ton of colors so getting something to match your corporate colors should be pretty easy.

Here are the typical imprint areas (and imprint sizes) for a swivel drive:

Drives come in all sorts of shapes and materials so you should have no trouble finding a drive that suits your style and budget. Many of the suppliers who cater to the promotional products industry are capable of making your custom design. You'll pay a bit more for a custom design but having something that is unique to your company might be worth the expense. Here's an example

Here's the take away: all chips are not created equal. Insist on Tier 1 memeory with a lifetime warranty.

Hope this was helpful and drop me a comment if you have any questions.

Havin' Some Fun with Colors!

In my last blog I said that the two areas where a promo project could go wrong were artwork and time.

I lied.

You can add color to the list. Putting your logo on something, in color, can be a frustrating process. The client (you), the distributor (me) and the supplier (the people who put your logo on your stuff) may all be speaking a different language when it comes to color.

So in this blog I'm going to cover the 2 major color systems. I'll show you how they differ and how to understand them when you're talking about decorating your promo item.

You might remember being taught in grade school art class that black and white are not colors. Black is the presence of all colors, white is the absence of all color. Occasionally this will come up in decorating a promotional product when someone will think that black or white doesn't count in determining the number of colors being used to print their logo. They do because they are inks that have to be mixed.

And that's just the beginning of fun with colors!

What comes next could easily be described as TMI  (too much information). But if you're involved with promotional products this stuff is going to come up sooner or later so you might as well have some information on your side.

There are 2 color systems: RGB and CMYK.

RGB, (red,green,blue), is the color system you see on your monitor, TV or digital camera. It's called an additive process because you can make all possible colors by adding different parts of red, green and blue.

This little illustration shows how RGB works.
See how you can add, (remember this is called an additive process) more or less of the primary colors to make pretty
much any color you want.








Here's another look at the RGB color scheme

The other color scheme is called CMYK, (cyan, magenta, yellow and black). The CMYK process is the one used in printing..for putting an image on a piece of paper.

CMYK, (also known as process color or four color printing), is a subtractive process. It works by partially or entirely masking colors on a lighter (usually white) background. The inks reduce the light that otherwise would be reflected back into your eyes. It subtracts from the white. It's the combination of the ink colors that determines what wave length (and consequently what color) is reflected back to you.

Because CMYK is subtractive and is being reflected off of a surface, CMYK colors are often a bit duller looking than RGB colors. 

Here's an illustration that gives you an idea of how this works in printing.

Here's a quick YouTube video that explains the two color models.

Whew! That was alot!

artwork...where promo products projects go bad!

There are 2 places where promotional products projects go bad fast...artwork and time.

Here's a piece of artwork

Renoir's "Two Sisters (On the Terrace)"

This is not what we mean when we talk about "artwork" for your promotional product or corporate apparel.

"Artwork" is the term used throughout the promotional products industry and refers to your design or logo.
It refers to any image or text that you want to see imprinted on your promotional item.

When your company's logo was created by a graphic artist they most likely created a few versions of the same image. One type is a "bitmap" or "pixel art" version. You'll recognize the file extensions like "jpg," tiff," or "gif." These are low resolution files most commonly used to send images back and forth by e-mail.

The other version is called "vector art." This is a high resolution file used for accurate reproduction of the design. It is scale able, meaning it can be enlarged without becoming distorted.

Pixel art is made up of individual squares of color. Vector art is derived from mathematical formulas that define the edges of the design. I don't begin to understand the math involved. But what you need to know is that when you enlarge "pixel art" the edges become ragged. When you enlarge vector art the edges remain smooth.

The best way to understand this is to show you some illustrations. You'll get what I'm talking about right away.

It's real easy to see from this image how the edges remain smooth with the vector art and become ragged in the bitmap.

Here's another.

This shows you pretty clearly what happens when you enlarge the two styles.

Here's one more just to emphasize the differences.

This shows you very clearly how the edges become ragged with pixel art and remain smooth with vector art.

What does this mean for your promo product or corporate apparel project?

The first thing to know is that the industry standard is vector art. Anytime you want to put your logo on something the supplier is going to want vector art. (You can't take a piece of pixel art and save it as an 'eps' file. It remains pixel art. Your design needs to be created as vector art in a program such as Illustrator.)

So, if you are planning a promotional product project make sure you have your logo in the proper format. Make sure you find that out before you start. The worst thing is to working under a tight deadline and finding out that the supplier can't work with your artwork because it's low resolution pixel art. Everything is going to stop dead in its tracks until you can supply the right kind of art.

Check your artwork now, make sure you've got the right format and be prepared with different versions depending on the size of the item.

Good luck and I hope this was helpful.

a few more things about logos

Putting a logo on something gets more complicated, and more expensive, when there are multiple colors.

Let me show you what I mean.

Here is the logo for Colonial Spirits. Colonial Spirits is a very nice wine, spirits and beer store in Acton Mass.










This is a 3 color logo. The text is maroon and is outlined in a dark blue. The Minute Man is dark blue and a gray blue.

Here's the first thing to notice; the maroon text outlined in dark blue.
It would be virtually impossible to screen print this. Why? You would first put down the maroon ink for the text. Then you would put down the dark blue outline. But look, there is no space between the two colors. They are right next to each other.
This is called "registration." You could not get the screen for the blue outline to consistently align with the text. Even the most accurate screen printing can't get closer than 1/32" registration with most needing 1/16"
If you did that to this logo you would lose the effect of outlining the text.

You would have the same problem trying to print the Minute Man. The colors are again too close.

So how do you capture this logo on a promotional item?

Colonial Spirits ordered wine glasses to have for their tastings. The glasses  weren't meant to be gifts, just used in-store for the tastings. So for that use they decided that it was not critical to reproduce the entire logo. Here's their solution:



They screen printed just their name, in their maroon color and left out the blue outline.











The other glass they ordered was a whiskey glass. This also was for in store tastings. In this case the glasses were going to be given to their customers. This glass needed to have the full color logo.

                                                                             Here's how it looked:




The whiskey glass has the full color logo. How was it done?
We used a decal. This way the logo can be printed directly on the decal material and then applied to the glass. There's no need to worry about registration since the decal is a digital print - much the same as printing on paper.

It's a bit more expensive but it allows all the details of the logo to be captured.

Takeaway: Anticipate how you may be using your logo on promotional products. Have several different versions of your logo. Decide, in advance, how you want your logo to appear if you can only use 1 color.
Decide, in advance, how you want your logo to appear if it is long and horizontal. If you have a tag line,
or a service or trade mark these will often be too small to be legible - can you use your logo without them?

About logos and promotional products...

Much has been written about logos. Their design.The use and significance of color. How they represent a company's identity. The role of the logo in branding a company. There are as many definitions of what a logo is as there are people writing about logos.

For this blog though I'm going to use a pretty simple definition: A logo is a graphic symbol that represents your brand.

Paul Wyatt at Creative Blog posted on June 14 a great piece titled "Logo design: 60 pro tips."
Although it's written for the graphic design folks it is worth your while if you are at all involved in branding your company or designing your company's logo.

For this post I'm going to talk about your logo and putting it on promotional products. I'm going to show you possible problems and how to anticipate them.

When a graphic design firm creates a logo they also create a "style book." The style book dictates everything about presenting the logo.  How it can be rendered, the colors, what background colors, etc.
Most often the style book deals with how the logo can be presented in print and on-line. Often it does not deal with how the logo can be used on a promotional item. If you are involved with the design of your logo you should have your graphics team address this.

What can go wrong?

Each promotional product will have a "maximum imprint area." This is the space on the item where your logo goes. (Many products will have more than one imprint area, they may not be the same size.)
Keep in mind that this is the maximum area for your logo.
Let's take a pen.
The imprint area might be on the barrel and it may be something like 1.5" L x .5" H. Your logo has to fit within that area..and keep its proportions. So the actual print of your logo may be smaller than that 1.5" x .5" area in order to keep the proportions and fit within the imprint area.

An overly long horizontal logo will have a problem.

Here's the primary logo of our client Cambridge Savings Bank

You can see where this might be a problem for an imprint area that's not geared for a long horizontal logo.

Anticipating this they created a "stacked" version of their logo.

With this version they can use a smaller or non horizontal space.

When you work with your design team you want them consider how your logo can be rendered on promotional items with various imprint areas.

Your promotional products vendor can easily get this information for you on any product.

Another potential problem comes up with logos that have tag lines and phone and web addresses. On smaller items, like a pen, when you attempt to squeeze all that information into a small space you end up with text that is too small to read. The open spaces in letters will fill in. Anticipate this and have a version that does not have all that information.

Interesting aside: A recent study on promotional products found that most recipients do not use the promotional item as a source for your contact information. If they want to contact you they'll google your name and find you that way. Putting your phone and web address on an item is not critical.

To sum up: Design your logo, or have it designed, with the kinds of promotional products you'll use in mind.
Any design can be reproduced accurately in print or on-line. Not so with promotional products.

Terms you should know...

If you are in any way involved in buying promo items for your company, here are some common terms. . Knowing what they mean or how they're used will make you more knowledgeable.

Decoration: Anytime you put your logo on an item, that's called decoration. Doesn't matter the method of imprinting, (silk screen, laser engraved, pad printing, etc.) they're all called decoration.

Column pricing. Here's a typical catalog page showing pricing. This is for a USB flash drive.






The top line shows quantities with 50 being the "first column." In this case 50 USB drives is this supplier's minimum quantity for an order. (This is also called the "catalog minimum."). You'll see that the price goes down as the  quantity goes up. This is called "quantity price breaks." So, between 50 and 99 pieces the price per USB drive is $6.81, between 100 and 249 pieces the price is $6.53...and so on.
2500 pieces is the "end column" price.

About "catalog minimum." Often, but not always, a supplier will take an order for less than the "catalog minimum." In most cases they will take an order for 1/2 of that minimum. This is called a "less-than-minimum" order or LTM. There will be a surcharge added to the order to produce LTM. It can range from $25 up to as much as $80 depending on the supplier.

About the "Price" row. The price is per item. The price includes the item and a 1 color, 1 location decoration.

Set-up. Set-up is what the supplier does to convert your logo (from a digital file) into the proper format for them to decorate your product. This could be silk screening, embroidery, laser engraving, etc. The supplier has to "set-up" their machines to decorate your item. The set-up is a separate charge.

Run Charge.Remember that I said that the price includes a 1 color decoration. What happens if your logo has more than 1 color? Printing a 2nd color (or more) is where you encounter the "run charge." It is the supplier's charge to put that 2nd color on your item. It is quoted as a per piece price. The run charge also applies to printing in a 2nd  location. Let's say that you have a 1 color logo going on the USB drive. That first imprint is included in the price. Now let's say you want your web address on the other side of the USB drive. Printing in that 2nd location will involve a run charge.

PMS color match.Most corporate logos have very specific colors. These colors are designated by their PMS numerical code. PMS 032 for instance is what you might call a "fire engine" or "crayon red."
PMS stands for Pantone Matching System and is the universal code for creating colors.
When you specify your PMS color the supplier will add a charge to mix up a batch of ink in your specific color.
Most suppliers have a selection of their "standard colors" for which there is no additional charge. You should have your distributor check those colors...a standard color might be close enough to your PMS color that it's an acceptable substitute...you can save yourself the PMS color match charge.

Proof. A proof is the supplier's depiction of what your logo will look like on the product you're buying. Most proofs are PDFs and show the item in your color with your logo in your colors. That's the industry standard.. If you receive a proof that is B&W or just shows your logo without the product, I recommend that you insist on a color proof.

That covers the charges you will have for a typical promotional product order. Knowing these terms will make you a better buyer and will avoid surprises in your final invoice.

The origins myth...

The origins myth in the promotional products industry has it that the very first promo item was a seed bag printed with the name of the seed supplier.
Not to be outdone, another local seed supplier made his bags into book covers for the local school.

Who knows?

Now the vast majority of promotional items are made in Asia with most originating in China.

Here's how the industry is set up.

Factories in Asia produce items under contract from suppliers here in the US. Most of these factories are contracted but a few of the largest suppliers have their own factories.

The suppliers here in the US import the goods blank...with no logos.
The suppliers warehouse the blank items.
Distributors place their order with the supplier, providing the end-user's logo.

The suppliers put the end-user's logo on the items and ship the completed order to the end-user.

Distributors are the intermediaries between the end-user and the suppliers. They're the promotional products vendors that the end-user works with. Distributors coordinate the order flow, handle all the back and forth and ultimately make sure that the end-user gets the product they want on time.

So, what did we learn?

Factories in Asia (mostly China) manufacture blank promotional items.
They ship them in bulk to suppliers here in the US
The suppliers warehouse the blank items. They then imprint them when orders come in.
Distributors coordinate the order flow between the end-user and the supplier.