Corporate Gifts: Giving Away Profits

To cement excellent business relations there is nothing
better than a little gift giving, whether to an important
client or a valued employee. But be sure to follow the
guidelines or corporate policy of the company which is to
benefit from your gift. There are often restrictions placed
on the value of the gift. Guidelines can be obtained from
the personnel department.

After checking corporate policy, a gift should be selected
carefully according to the position, interests and hobbies
of the recipient. While the holiday season is the most
popular time for the giving of corporate gifts, there are
many other occasions which can be made the most of,
including the anniversary of an important date for the
business, such as its founding, the opening of a new office
or the opening of a new office or branch. Retirement,
marriage, birth of a new baby, and promotion are just few
of the excellent moments when one can show deep
appreciation by giving corporate gifts to encourage loyalty
and strengthen team ties, that is gift giving should be
limited to only a few occasions a year.

As for the company logo, while having this appear on the
gift does act as free advertising, it is only appropriate
for gifts which will be in use daily, such as key chains,
drinking mugs, caps and ballpoints. The logo should never
be used if the gift is meant to come from you personally.
Appropriate gifts include electrical goods and appliances,
travel or alarm clocks, food such as hampers, tickets for
shows or travel and that old favorite, desk accessories.
Be sure if you are giving internationally that you are
abiding by the customs of the country where you are giving.
Inappropriate behavior could backfire and be extremely
damaging to your corporate image. In 2005 corporate gift
giving sank among U.S. companies against of pre-tax
profits, despite the huge corporate responses to Hurricane
Katrina and the Asian tsunami which were so splashed across
the media. US companies gave more than $1bn in disaster
relief for victims of these disasters. The total amount
given by companies like Wal-Mart, AIG and Citigroup went
from 14% to $8.56bn, but a percentage of pre-tax profits
declined to 0.9 per cent from 1.1 per cent the year before.
Considering profit growth, the decline was probably
unexpected. Two-thirds of the donations from companies were
in kind.

The top bids generally want their philanthropy to be
aligned with their business strengths. Deloitte, the
consultancy, prefers for example to withhold cash and to
offer its services to charities instead. Pharmaceutical
companies such as Eli Lilly and Merck and Pfizer tend to
give a larger proportion of medicine and supplies than
cash. Annual contributions from 88 leading donors are in
the region of $10bn, which is about half of all corporate
philanthropy in the US. The median gift is about $32m. The
other 17,000 companies in America are clearly not pulling
their weight.

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Jerry Carpos of http://www.portraitkingdom.com features
business corporate gift. Be informed with the latest in
the corporate world and see how portraits can make a set of
unique corporate gifts.