“Kick-Ass Promotional Marketing Agency” may be a self-proclaimed moniker for Sonic Promos (asi/329865), but the Gaithersburg, MD-based distributor wants to make sure it lives up to that gnarly ideal. Thus was born its 2015 Sonic Promo Apparel Program, a campaign designed to showcase the company’s customer apparel capabilities and eye for trendy offerings while growing its wearable sales.

“We are ahead of the trends; we are technologically advanced and are more than a promo product company,” says President Seth Weiner. “We wanted to show that we will utilize our resources to deliver products, but we can also produce compelling campaigns and programs.”

The program began by sending out a custom teddy bear that requested the recipient’s size through email or a Google form. Then, every two to three months, Sonic Promos sent a new custom item with high-end decoration in the hope that the recipients would wear them. The items included a hoodie and jacket from Trimark (asi/92121) that utilized different combinations of transfer, etching and Infusion decoration; a wicking shirt from SanMar (asi/84863) with a metallic foil decal; and a trendy T-shirt with custom-dye PMS-matched color and custom inside tag from Golden Goods. Each piece came with an accompanying card and detailed info on the items, and each box was also marked with Sonic’s apparel program decal.

By sending these items to the company’s top 150 accounts, Sonic Promos was able to generate an additional $1 million in revenue, half of which was for the same or similar items that were sent to the recipients. The distributor also landed an annual apparel program of $100,000 (after years of trying to gain the business) and two additional shirt orders worth a combined $120,000. Kick-ass indeed.