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A Short History Of Promotional Mugs
By Gareth Parkin
The tradition of merchants showing appreciation to those who bought their wares (spices, pelts, cloth etc.) probably reaches back into the earliest days of mankind; when the evolution of society reached the stage where individual tribes and families had more than enough resources for themselves and were able to peddle some of their excess.
Put your imagination into gear and visualize how the earliest of merchants discovered the value of customer relationships. The tradition of showing appreciation through the distribution of business and promotional items is only an offshoot of the genius that the earliest of merchants had discovered. Business owners and corporations in today's world call this tradition of "giving back" marketing and promotion.
Taking this line of thought, regarding the evolution of marketing and promotion a little further, it might be fun to imagine how the tradition of giving away promotional mugs might have occurred. Imagine, if you will, people living in the stone-age discovering that pounding out a indentation in a rock made that rock into a vessel that could hold fluid or liquids -voila! - say hello to the first promotional mug.
As with most endeavors human beings become involved in, more is better, so the earliest of merchants and peddlers had the insight to see there were potential revenue possibilities in their invention of the "stone-age mug". Tribes, families and clans began to mass produce stone mugs and it wasn't long before they began peddling these mugs to buy/trade for other items the clan or family needed.
Now fast forward your imagination to a later period of time, say the beginning of the Industrial Age, and you can see that the stone mug has had quite a bit of adaptation and renovation in style, design, materials and art. Mugs are now so plentiful every household has a cupboard full of them. There are some made a precious metals as well as not so preciousness metals. You can see mugs made of clay, wood, glass, china and bone. The mugs of this time are decorated with

precious stones and carved with inlaid designs. You will see mugs that have been fired in a kiln to a high glaze and that have beautifully painted decorations and designs.
Can you also see how these new and improved mugs would have been wonderful promotional items to give to loyal customers? It is historically documented that Kings and Queens received exquisite mugs made of gold and silver and precious stones as promotional gifts. The reasons for the gifting varied but the promotional mugs were used as a token or giveaway item to thank them for a deed they had done or to seal the deal on an arranged marriage or the passing off of land perhaps.
It is not difficult to see how the mugs of the era described above are not so different than the promotional mugs distributed by the merchants and tradesmen of today; with the exception of the new plastics that are so plentiful in our world. The tradition of giving mugs as token of esteem is still in operation today and is a time-proven strategy for letting customers, Heads of State, Kings and Queen's, etc., know they are valued for their loyalty and their business.
Now that you have imagined the evolution of promotional mugs get my make the process of selection and distribution a little more fun and interesting when you hand out your promotional printed mugs to customers and patrons you might offer a little bit of insight through a conversation about the history of promotional mugs.

Gareth Parkin is the co-founder of Ideasbynet, the UK's largest online source of promotional mugs and printed mugs. He has taken the UK gift market by storm by the application of modern business thinking and the latest search engine marketing techniques. For more details visit www.ideasbynet.com.