Association anniversaries and longevity
I saw this photo on one of my favorite blogs - she posted it because of its looks, but it's fascinating on many levels for me.
First: we don't do giveaways like we used to as an industry. (matchbooks? really?)
Second: How many of the tschotchkes we create will be around in 42 years? (unused?)
Third: You never know whose life has been touched by an association...
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Comments
This rang a bell with me. My grandmother collected matchbooks and gave me her collection at some point, which I added to until matchbooks basically disappeared. I still love looking at the ones she collected in Paris in the 1920s during her flapper girl days, the ones from the bar I worked at in Aspen way back when...no association matches, though.
I guess these days it would be pens--I know I have a plethora of them from everyone and everything. But somehow, it's just not the same...
Posted by: Sue Pelletier | September 3, 2008 5:25 PM
I love that the fonts and graphics on the matchbook are so clearly from the 1960s. It's the same reason I love to look at old issues of association magazines--to see design choices they made back in the day ...
I tend to save tchotchkes I can use, so I have a ton of pens and notepads from various companies. My last association found that a lot of our members really liked a combination clock/calulator thingy, although I wonder how long the batteries in them lasted--probably not 42 years!
Posted by: Lisa Junker | September 4, 2008 9:09 AM
Hey Betsy,
Nice seeing you here! I never knew it until I did a project for my PPAI friends in Dallas, but they are fond of reminding us that "promotional products are an $18+ billion industry and a widely-overlooked marketing vehicle for general brand identity and awareness raising." (Or something like that, working from memory.)
I think there's always something about the business that will lead us to equate it with volunteer recognition things rather than consumer focused items, but they can still be great little tokens that remind us of an association or a cause. Of course the big charities do a boatload of small scale cheap premiums (not because they like them but becuase they test-market really well). So as a result we all have entire drawers full of personalized mailing labels, and shiny tokens that inadvertently ruin our shredders when we 'process' our mail.
I actually like the matchbook. And every year I still find 2 or 3 things when I patrol the ASAE and AFP exhibit floors that feel well worth stealing. Although then again, they rest in the same drawer with the labels waiting for me to move again and throw them all away...
kevin
Posted by: Kevin Whorton | September 6, 2008 9:26 AM