2018 Top 50 Distributors: DiscountMugs.com's Tech Investments, Outside-Industry Leadership

Each year, Promo Marketing compiles the Top 50 promotional products distributors into one comprehensive list. For a peek behind the curtain at how some of those tremendously successful companies work, we asked a few of them to share their thoughts on the promo industry, their plans for the future, what it takes to make the become (and stay) a top distributor, and more. Here, we profiled DiscountMugs.com, No. 6 on the 2018 Top 50 Distributors list.

Coming in at No. 6 on our 2018 list, with approximately $210 million in promotional products sales, was DiscountMugs.com. We spoke to David Giacomini, chief 
marketing officer for the distributor, about what sets the company apart, the company’s goals moving forward and tech’s ever-increasing role in the promo business.

Technology First

David Giacomini, chief 
marketing officer, DiscountMugs.com

With tech continuing to change the way distributors do business, 
DiscountMugs.com, an online-only business, has taken advantage of 
everything it has to offer. We consider ourselves to be a technology 
company first and foremost,” said Giacomini. “As an online-only 
e-commerce distributor, our investments in technology are focused on improving our overall customer experience. We invest heavily in technology that allows us to produce orders much faster than traditional distributors.”

“This allows us to get the order to our customers hands much faster and at a lower cost,” he continued. “With nearly 100 percent of our orders originating online, we also invest heavily in website improvements to improve usability, boost conversion rates and increase customer satisfaction.”

2017 Success

Looking back on the past year, Giacomini offered several reasons 
why DiscountMugs.com was a top distributor. “Online growth in the 
promotional products category continues to grow at a faster pace than offline,” he said. “We naturally are well positioned to take advantage of this growth. In addition, we made numerous critical hires in 2017, as well as significant investments in technology and process improvements. While revenue and profits grew in 2017, many of our improvements helped lay the foundation of even greater growth in 2018 and beyond.”

Besides its embrace of technology, Giacomini provided some insight into what drives DiscountMugs.com’s success in the promo world.

“Being a customer-centric, data-driven organization has contributed 
significantly to our success,” he said. “We do not focus on industry 
competitors and often look to make disruptive improvements to our 
business. Having the majority of our leadership team from outside of the industry gives us a fresh perspective on growing the business without bias. We found that the traditional distributor industry has somewhat legacy thinking and rarely challenged conventional thinking.”

Looking ahead, Giacomini said the company plans to stay competitive and continue growing by focusing on its customers and always adapting to their needs.

“To do this, we must continue to invest in technology and instill a culture of continual improvement that is willing to take entrepreneurial risks and be a disruptive force in the marketplace.”

View the full 2018 Top 50 Distributors list here, or click here for stats, trends and analysis from the list. For more in this top distributors profiles series, click here to download a free PDF resource containing all six interviews.