Friday Rewind

Justin Lawrence, Amy Baker and Rich Santo discussed how they pursued new product categories and sales verticals after the pandemic hit, and also how the community aspect of the industry helped them achieve growth, even when the cards were stacked against them...

There are usually shipping delays around the end of the year as consumers, retailers and corporate buyers ramp up holiday purchases. This year, though, might be unlike anything we've ever seen—both in overall volume and in timing. FedEx and UPS have told some shippers that they're already at or near shipping capacity for the remainder of the year...

Small businesses are the lifeblood of the community. Today, when all it takes to buy online is a click of a button, it can be easy to forget about the mom-and-pop businesses around the corner. But Sarah Barr, owner of Konhaus Print & Marketing, Camp Hill, Pa., turned a way to showcase local businesses into a fun game, and even managed to do some self-promotion in the process...

We all have comfy clothes we turn to when we don’t feel well, like an especially soft hoodie or a favorite pair of sweatpants. Mucinex is trying to do more to make sick people feel better by introducing a line of “Sickwear,” stylish designer apparel pieces that help you feel better and look great. The…

It’s hard to take Kanye West’s presidential run as seriously as he seems to. He’s not even on the ballot in some states, and this always seemed like more of a branding opportunity than an actual attempt to land in the Oval Office. But, of course, Kanye still dropped official campaign merchandise. And, on brand for Kanye, it’s much more streetwear drop than traditional campaign merch...

Following up on its moves to give TikTok and YouTube creators ways to sell merchandise directly in-app, Teespring is now giving online content creators the option of selling “digital merchandise.” It’s an interesting twist for a company that built itself on T-shirts to now deal with digital products like filters, digital planners and other social-media ready “items"...

The Canadian government recently unveiled its plan to ban single-use plastics on a national level. The legislation, which includes a ban on single-use grocery checkout bags, straws, stir sticks, six-pack rings, plastic cutlery and food takeout containers from “hard-to-recycle plastics,” is set to go into effect by the end of 2021, Environmental Minister Jonathan Wilkinson said...

Garland Writing Instruments, Coventry, R.I., announced this week that it will be closing for good as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. You might recognize Garland as the company that manufactured the pens that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi used to sign the articles of impeachment against Donald Trump earlier this year...

For promotional products businesses, normalcy means trade shows. We talked to promo insiders, an analyst at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and an executive at the International Association of Events and Exhibitions to find out what the industry is doing without shows and events, when they might return and what they'll look like when they do...

Ahead of the November presidential election, Anheuser-Busch is reportedly sending over 8 million ounces of its sanitizer to polling locations across the U.S. That comes out to around 62,500 gallons. For perspective, if you put all that sanitizer into gallon jugs and placed them in a line, it'd stretch for almost five and a half miles...