A Fresh, Upscale Alternative to the Traditional Holiday Gifts Brings in New Business for Taconic Builders

Challenge: To source a USB drive not readily available on the web

Each year, thousands of companies give tens of thousands of holiday gifts to tens of thousands of customers. Many are content to give traditional gifts like apparel, pens, calendars, wine, cookies and candy. Other firms search high and low for gifts related to the business at hand—calculators for accounting firms, tire gauges for auto shops, picture frames for photographers, iPods or Blackberries for technically oriented organizations.

The New York based Taconic Builders, Inc., developer of some of the country’s finest residential and commercial properties, has, until this year, fit into the latter category, regularly sending construction-related gifts to its property owner, architect and design clients. They have, now and again, broken from tradition, interspersing trade gifts like tape measures with traditional gifts like chocolates. Little did the team know that, during one typical client meeting, tradition was about to change.

Client representatives gathered round the table, as did the Taconic team and several contractors—one of whom carried with him a USB drive. “What’s that?” the team wondered. “Where did you get it?” asked another. The contractor showed the team the USB drive he received as a gift elsewhere, raving about how useful it was for transporting electronic files between various non-networked locations. The Taconic team was hooked; they found the idea of a Taconic-branded USB drive altogether attractive, perfect for this year’s client gifts! The USB drive struck the team as fresh and upscale; they also knew clients would use them since much work today is digitized.

Solution: ePromos taps its deep vendor well to locate the ideal USB drive

Enter ePromos. The Taconic team had done their research and wanted a particular USB drive not available through our product-rich Web site. No problem. ePromos Promotions Specialist Jason Wallace reached into our deep well of off-site vendors to locate just the right product—a one gigabyte USB drive in a handsome granite gray that fit the builder theme while matching perfectly with Taconic’s color logo.

Result: Grateful clients, renewed client relationships and a new tool for the sales arsenal

In early December, the USB drives began making their way to Taconic clients and partners in New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Seattle, Canada, London and more. And soon thereafter, grateful responses poured in: “This year you went above and beyond,” said one Taconic client. “This is so much better than a personalized pen—it’s useful!” said another. Many were surprised by the gift’s unexpected high quality. Even better, several architects the team hadn’t talked to in a few years reconnected again to say thanks—and to discuss new projects. The Taconic team, moved by the unexpected but thoroughly delightful response to the branded USB drives, now plans to use them as sales leave-behinds, possibly to provide additional firm and project information, definitely to incent additional contract signings.

Find other products to promote in the Construction Industry.
Find Business Gifts for your Architecture and Design clients.
Check out our collection of Promotional USB Drives.
Need Holiday Gifts? Browse through our Corporate Gift Collection.

Taconic Builders USB Drives Holiday Gifts (PDF Version)