Drinkware

New Hyde Park, New York-based Gordon Sinclair president Rachel Halpern announced the appointment of industry veteran Ray Rodriguez to the newly created position of vice of president of sales and marketing. The appointment is effective January 1, 2010.

Prime Line, Bridgeport, Conn., announced it has received full certification by the Chicago-based Quality Certification Alliance (QCA). To achieve this certification, Prime Line had to successfully pass a detailed review of its product safety, quality, social and environmental practices, including a comprehensive review of its procedures, a four-day audit of its headquarters in Bridgeport, Conn., and audits of several of its factories in China.

The sales team from City of Industry, California-based, Sweda Company donned colorful tuxedos at the kickoff of the PPAI show in Las Vegas last week to celebrate their new Web enhancement SMARTSearch, an online browsing tool that filters by product category, color and price range.

Mario Guevara, chief executive officer of the BIC Group said, "In decreasing markets, our consumer business shows good resilience and we have maintained or grown our market share in most categories and geographies while advertising and promotional products sales continued to decline,

In the ever-changing regulatory environment in which business is done, product safety is top-of-mind in the promotional products industry. Las Vegas-based DIGISPEC, and its sister companies

Clif Perryman, president of Toledo, Ohio-based Sabina, a decorator of drinkware with nearly 60 years of experience serving the promotional products industry

Leed’s, based in New Kensington, Pa., a member of Polyconcept North America, announced it has made changes to improve its SureShip program. In January, Leed’s expanded SureShip to include uploading onto USB memory devices. Now, three more of the program’s parameters have been expanded to encompass more orders.

New Kensington, Pennsylvania-based Leed’s, a member of Polyconcept North America, the second largest supplier within the promotional products industry, announced it has taken the next step to further secure its international supply chain by participating in an overseas audit and achieving Tier II certification with the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT).

THERE’S NO OTHER industry that appeals to and satisfies the five senses quite like the promotional products industry. If a treat is needed to sweeten a business deal, there is no shortage of companies offering up the right confections. If a tune is required to spread good will, a selection of suppliers can be found on the playlist. The five senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell battle for equal airtime in an industry that’s all about getting customers’ names out there. Following, industry suppliers offering products representa-tive of each sensory category share their take on why their items are the most

VARIETY MIGHT VERY well be the spice of life, but as seasoned chefs can confirm, too much of a good thing often ruins the pot. The perfect accompaniment deliciously complements, without overpowering, a main course. Not unlike the contents of the kitchen spice rack, “Drinkware comes in many different sizes, colors and price points, so it makes a perfect option in almost every distributor presentation,” said Brian P. Padian, vice president of inside sales at Tustin, California-based Logomark. Yet, in creating success-ful drinkware promotions, distributors can benefit from the discretion, foresight and planning of the most elite culinary artists to find the right