Extending Your Custom Awards with Add-On Components

Maximize Your Custom Award Impact with Integrated Components

Many of the custom award designs that we have created for our clients are very large and intricate. While this helps makes a memorable impression at an awards ceremony, the cost associated with these larger custom awards often makes it infeasible to present them to a very large base of award recipients. 

In some cases, however, our clients would like to expand the number of people they recognize with their custom awards, both for the external branding benefits these awards provide, as well as the positive impact they make on the award recipients.

Custom Corporate Gifts: Branded Add-On Components

One unique and creative way to accomplish this objective is to create add-on components for your custom awards. These add-on components help establish an integrated, multi-level awards program that you can extend to a broader base of recipients. There are many possible form-factor s for these add-on elements, including medallions, key chains, pins, and plaques.

There are a couple broad ways to approach these add-on components: 1) they can mirror the design of the larger custom award, but in a smaller form factor; or 2) a new custom design can be created for these components that compliments the design of the larger awards.

One example of the first approach (identical design) are the medallions / key chains we created for Facebook’s company half marathon. The centerpiece custom award we created for this event was a perpetual trophy that sits in Facebook’s trophy case at their corporate headquarters in Palo Alto. Each year, the names of the race winners are added to the trophy. However, to extend the reach of this recognition design, we also created custom medallions (which can also serve as key chains) in a similar shape and design as the perpetual award, and these are presented to the first through third place finishers in various event categories. 

Custom Lapel Pins

An example of the second approach is the lapel pins we created for the Wounded Warrior Project’s (WWP) Carry Forward Awards. The main custom awards for this event are pewter backpack sculptures mounted on intricately engraved bases. However, the WWP also wanted to give attendees of their recognition event a momento that would serve as a lasting keepsake. We created a lapel pin design that picked up certain elements of the main award, and these lapel pins were presented to event attendees.

These are just a couple examples of integrated custom recognition programs we have created for our clients. These integrated designs create an opportunity to make both a recognition and a branding statement across a broad audience. If you have an upcoming recognition event or presentation, we would love to work with you to put these practices into motion!