Bringing in new business is crucial for any print provider. For Deer Valley Unified School District’s Print Services (asi/181039) operation, promo products were an opportunity that couldn’t be overlooked.

“We’re always looking for additional revenue,” says Martin James, manager of the Phoenix-based in-plant, a printing industry term for print shops that operate within schools, nonprofits or other organizations. “So that was the biggest reason to [add promo].”

Erik Hackenschmidt (left) and Martin James have helped boost the revenue of Deer Valley Unified School District’s Print Services (asi/181039) operation by expanding into promotional products.

After a modest start in 2017, the in-plant’s promo products business grew rapidly, reaching more than $100,000 in revenue in FY 2020-21. When Erik Hackenschmidt was brought in to handle the business, revenue increased 65% and has continued to grow.

The beauty of promotional products is that the sky is pretty much the limit. If it has a surface that you can print ink on, it can serve as a promotional product. That means print providers can work with products like apparel, toys, office supplies, stickers, tablecloths, drinkware and even food.

Getting Started

Of course, it’s still within your best interest to choose products that appeal to the end-user and fit within the context of what you’re doing. For James and Hackenschmidt, that meant starting with basics like pens, pencils and lanyards – items school employees and students use on a daily basis.

“That’s where we got our feet wet,” James says. The in-plant has expanded well beyond that and now even sells apparel.

“We have our wholesale contracts with two of the biggest blanks distributors in the country for our apparel,” he says. “Promotional items drew us into apparel, so that’s part of our business as well.”

With so many different options for branded applications, having an in-plant serve as the source of promotional products means all of the branding is appropriate and conveys the image your parent organization wants, proponents say.

“It keeps up the brand standards, whether it be our own district or others,” Hackenschmidt says. “It allows us to keep those standards, so somebody [doesn’t] go off and do something entirely outside of what their normal district standard would be.”

That means something as simple as limiting anything relating to alcohol from bearing the school district’s name.

From there, once people know about an in-plant’s promotional products capabilities, more business opportunities will arise. That’s exactly how this in-plant went from using promo as a little side gig to a six-figure source of revenue.

“Also, it brings more customers in to what we do,” James adds. “They might be interested in promotional items, and we’ll sell them apparel and we’ll sell them print. We’ll sell them direct mail. It’s just the relationship and seeing the right opportunity to offer enough products to our customers so they come to us first.”

The promotional products world can take some learning to an outsider, so becoming a member of organizations like ASI and taking advantage of trade shows and educational events can be important to understanding how things work and making a print shop’s promotional venture profitable.

“In order to be in this business, you have to be in an association to get your foot in the door, to be able to find all of the [suppliers] that are here,” James says.

Fostering Growth

James uses trade shows to advertise his in-plant to other school districts and associations looking for promotional and print products. Organizations catering to superintendents and school districts are gold mines for potential customers.

“We go to trade shows to promote our business to other school districts and associations that are part of school districts,” James says. “The superintendents’ association, the school districts’ association, ASA, ASBO – each state has its own individual association like that.”

Deer Valley Unified School District found success and revenue growth with promotional products by taking advantage of all the industry platforms available to distributors and creating online ordering platforms that facilitate business. While it’s all under one roof, the district in-plant uses different sites due to the sheer volume of products available in the promo and apparel sector of the business.

“We have a promo site, we have an apparel site, we have a print site,” James says. “We’d like to merge them all together, but you really can’t because this site is unique unto itself with all of the thousands and thousands of different promotional items that you can buy.”

Once products are selected, the in-plant uses a 50% markup for products. Though they’re certainly proud of achieving six figures in revenue from something that started as a glorified experiment, James and Hackenschmidt aren’t done. Both understand the potential in promotional products and continue to push it as a major service at their in-plant.