Online vs. Offline Sales (and Really Nice Luggage)

I've been in selling corporate promotional items and premiums now for more than 12 years. We began the transition to primarily a web based business about 3 years ago, and it has really become the substantial share of our sales in the last 12 months. One thing that I have learned is that the dollar value of the products that you tend to sell online is lower, and that the average sale is smaller than in traditional corporate sales. Granted, the internet works for you 24 hours a day, and it does a lot of the selling for you as customers seek you out, and you are able to interact with your customer in a way that is not possible offline. Selling online has also exponentially broadened our customer base and allowed us to go national. There are pros and cons to online selling, but we are pleased by in large that we made the choice that we did, and we are hopeful for the future of the company.

One thing I do miss is the really special and unique requests we used to get from some of our corporate clients. I have sold everything from high end watches, to snorkeling gear to custom pewter and marble chess sets. We used to stock a complete rewards program for a large international nutritional supplement company, and it gave us the opportunity to sell all kinds of different items ranging from neck ties, to beach promotions and apparel and outerwear of every level of quality. We just don't receive such unique assignments anymore.

It was always really fun to get a special request, and to acquaint oneself with new manufacturers and new products. I remember receiving a request for Zero Halliburton aluminum briefcases. These are such a cool and classic product. Zero Halliburton was not set up to sell through the advertising specialties industry, and as it turned out, I believe that I simply directed our client directly to Zero, because there was not room or logic for a middle man.

I went on to the Zero Halliburton website today, and saw that there product line is as gorgeous as I remembered it.

Zero now makes computer cases that are made from polycarbonate and are very strong. We just reroofed our greenhouse in polycarbonate, and I know it is strong from selling polycarbonate drinkware for years. We still have a significant collection of polycarbonate drinkware within our line of logo water bottles, but we have focused our marketing efforts on safe, customer centric BPA water bottles.

I decided to check out the Zero website, because I came across some beautiful luggage by Logomark Bettoni, and I just thought to myself how cool it would be to actually have a customer request an order of something like it. I think it is unlikely to sell these items from our website, because the pricepoint is so high. The highest end luggage which acts as a business premium is by Cutter & Buck such as this piece.