I have some other posts in the works, but I just wanted to put out a quick little post, because I was looking at the analytics for our website ameripromo.com and noticed that one hot little item is this Dual USB/Auto Heater Mug.

It keeps drinks piping hot and is the ultimate gift for the road warrior business person or can be powered by a USB connection on a computer to keep your soup or hot beverage ready.

I found it to be innovative, and since so many people are looking for it, I decided to give it a little press.

Thanksgiving is only two days away, and our house is bustling with activity. We are going to celebrate Thanksgiving with many of my wife's family as well as my parents and my three youngest siblings who are still at home.

We were gifted a turkey by a chef friend that must weigh at least 40 lbs. I honestly do not know what pan we are going to cook it in, but we were given gourmet instructions and recipe for cooking it, and it was raised wild on a large ranch in Eastern Oregon, so it will likely be a very yummy bird.

The day after Thanksgiving is traditionally the largest retail shopping day of the year. Truthfully, I hate shopping that day. I hate the lines, and even though the sales are a little bit better than usual, it seems that everything in department stores is always on sale anyway, and the savings just isn't worth the time tradeoff.

With five children of my own, I do get to play Santa Claus, and it is certainly enjoyable to shop for my children and everyone else. I do a lot of this online, where I can take my time, compare items and find things that I cannot locally. We try not to make the Santa Claus thing to big of a deal in our home, because the holiday is for us, first the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ; second a time to be with family; and lastly a time to get and give.

The Western tradition of Santa Claus is embedded more deeply in the subconscious than most other cultural icons and with good reason: there is just a lot to love about the jolly old man and the smiles he brings to the young and old.

There are a few promotional products with a Santa Claus theme. Here are links to three:

Santa Claus Stress Toy
Rubber Duck Santa Claus Very cool!
The Autobiography of Santa Claus (This book is imprintable with your company's logo.

One promotional item that continues to enjoy tremendous popularity is the water bottle. The promotional products industry and its retail counterparts have produced myriad new styles and functionality in their new products.

The biggest shift has been an upwards shift in quality, and a downwards shift in price on the high end. The ultimate waterbottle, in my opinion, is the polycarbonate water bottle with the threaded cap. It is generally available in handsome translucent colors and it makes a nice and crisp setting for a logo.

The lid styles and uses of polycarbonate water bottles continue to proliferate. Nalgene Outdoor pioneered the polycarbonate water bottle, and I learned today that Nalgene is now even doing baby bottles. Very cool.

Polycarbonate water bottles will not transfer the taste or smell of plastic to their beverage. These products are popular for advertising your logo at work, shopping centers, gyms, universities and other schools. They get used, and they make a company's advertising impression over and over again.

Due to their strong price/quality value, Polycarbonate bottles by H2Go are some of the most popular in the promotional products industry.

In my last post, I referenced the nesting instinct that often prevails in our thoughts and actions at this time of year. I've read multiple news articles and features that the desire to be closer to home isn't just seasonal. This desire to be at home and to nurture important relationships, and the spending patterns that accompany this trend has increased substantially since 9/11. The runup in housing prices is directly connected to this (although it is also the result of other macroeconomic and speculative factors as well, and housing prices are coming down a fact which is likely to continue until the excesses are wrung out of the market.)

Nevertheless, the nesting desire is reflected in our purchasing habits. We want to obtain things that represent family, and to enhance quiet evenings spent with friends and loved ones. We want to surround ourselves with beauty and with quality. There are many companies that are recognizing and capitalizing on this trend. Home improvement retailers, furniture makers and retailers, builders, mass market retailers, real estate and mortgage financing companies are all naturally suited to cater their offerings and their marketing to this trend.

However, any company wanting to offer a nice gift that enhances and appreciates this dynamic in the market place is making a good choice. And the gift will almost always be appreciated. Here are a few promotional product ideas for giving a nesting gift:

A logoed custom fondue set
Cutter & Buck desktop photo box
5 Piece Cheese Board
Big Sweatshirt Blanket

Giving gifts to employees and clients is a wonderful way to recognize and appreciate. Yet thing that really matters is the time and words of appreciation you give to the people you care about.

Just over the past couple of days, the weather has turned rainy. It is a comfortable rain, the type that quietly patters on the streets and sidewalks and windshields of cars. It grays the skies, and the fall colors take on subtle hues like those found in a soothing and subdued watercolor painting. The weather induces a certain nesting desire - to curl up with a good read or make a good cup of hot chocolate. I had my first cup of hot chocolate the other day.

I've been thinking about seasonal promotional items, fit for Thanksgiving and Christmas giving. Our clients over the years have given everything from food to nice jackets to their customers and employees over the years. One of the more popular gifts is the promotional coffee mug. However, it seems that everyone's cupboards and dextops are full of such mugs.

In order to stand out and be memorable, you have to do something a little extra. When a mug is given as a gift, one way to enhance its appeal is to add a mug stuffer. This is a foil bag of hot chocolate mix or coffee decorated with your company's logo or message. It gives a real polished feel to the gift.

Another important consideration is to select a mug that stands out - one that is a different shape or finish will get noticed before the classic "C" handled mug. I particularly like this one.

It is called the Seattle Mug. It has sharp contrasting white interior and hip color choices for the exterior.

I also really like the look of this elegant acrylic tumbler called the Monaco Tumbler.

Over the years, I have seen or sold hundreds of variations of drinkware. I love the strong selection at The Creative Source. They are very innovative in styling and will get a company noticed.

I have a thing for USB drives and flash memory. They also make very stylish promotional gifts. They come in so many shapes and sizes from the small keychain variants to the larger USB drives. They are available in credit card shapes, in translucent, or even in fully custom shapes such as in the shape of a jetliner.

They are useful, and have a spylike quality. I feel like Jack Bauer or James Bond, when I slide it into the USB Port to upload or download data.

The coolest USB drive that I have seen for high-perceived value promotional giving is this one. It is in leather and brushed metal and the leather can be debossed with a company logo. A gift like this gets used and appreciated and in my view is the perfect self-promoting executive gift.