CHARLESTON, S.C.—Sawgrass Technologies Consumer Division announces its NaturaLink B FREE ink contest. Sawgrass Technologies is giving away free ink every week until June 30, 2010. Weekly drawing winners will receive a coupon code good for one NaturaLink B for Brother GT 541 ink cartridge valued at $150.

CHARLESTON, S.C.—Sawgrass Technologies Consumer Division joins forces with Econscious to showcase a whole green-product solution. Sawgrass’ sublimation printing technology was used to decorate hundreds of Econscious reusable tote bags, made from recycled polyester.

MAULDIN, S.C.—Aprons Etc. celebrates its 25th anniversary serving as an industry advertising-specialty manufacturer and import supplier of corporate logo promotional products, including: aprons, smocks, vests, bandannas, disposable accessories and fleeceⁱ blankets.

CHARLESTON, S.C.—The Family Circle Cup, one of 20 Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Premier Events, selects Vapor Apparel to manufacture and design its 2010 apparel for this year’s tournament.
The Family Circle Cup, celebrating its 10th year in Charleston and 38th year on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, is scheduled for April 10–18, 2010, at the Family Circle Tennis Center in historic Charleston, S.C.
 -Read more-

The term “walking billboard” has never been more literal in our industry with the emerging trend of customized footwear making noticeable tracks in the realm of decorated apparel. With this segment trying hard to shed its specialty-market stigma, personalized shoes, socks, slippers and work boots are appearing in more mainstream programs, and making considerable margins for their sellers. 

An Internet search for the origin of the expression “work like a dog” returned only speculation as to the time period the phrase was first used. Certainly, it was long before Lennon and McCartney used it in the song A Hard Day’s Night in 1964. Dogs were the first domesticated animals that were put to work—pulling milk carts, for example—for their human masters and from that era surfaced other sayings such as “a dog’s life” (early 16th century) and “dog tired” (1800s).

Signatures Embroidery and OOBE Leave No Teacher Behind
MAULDIN, S.C.—Signatures Inc., a custom embroidery and apparel provider, partners with OOBE, an apparel design and manufacturing company, to recognize a large group who they feel are too often overlooked and underappreciated. For this initiative to provide free embroidered shirts for all public school employees in three counties, Signatures donated its embroidery services to put district and school logos on the OOBE-provided shirts for all public school teachers. The total number of custom-stitched shirts exceeded 15,000, and recipients of the free shirts also included members of the support staff among the 300-plus schools within the counties.

MYRTLE BEACH, S.C.—A broad-based group of market leaders met in Myrtle Beach at Special Markets Dialogues to assess the state of the market and identify key opportunities for 2010. Special Markets Dialogues brings together executives from a wide variety of organizations with a common purpose: The delivery of reward, recognition and corporate-identity solutions to corporate end users. It is facilitated by Pete Mitchell, director of business-to-business sales for Samsonite Corporation.

Among the main conference takeaways were that all stakeholders in the market, from suppliers and distributors to trade associations, must speak with a common voice to address challenges from current legislative and regulatory environments. In particular, the group endorsed the ongoing efforts of trade groups and the Incentive Federation with members of congress. Visit www.incentivefederation.org.

CHARLESTON, S.C.—Sawgrass Technologies Inc. announces its division into two new business units: Sawgrass Consumer Division and Sawgrass Industrial Division. This division is reportedly in response to increased demand and global synergies which have developed within the consumer and industrial market segments. “This realignment of resources enables the individual business units to globally serve each market’s unique customer needs. Sawgrass’ Consumer Division will focus on turnkey solutions for digitally printing consumer products, while the Industrial Division will focus on commercializing new technologies for mass customization of a wide variety of surfaces,” states Nathan Hale, CEO of Sawgrass Technologies.

TREVOSE, Pa.—BroderBros. Co. adds several fleeceⁱ styles to its Total Team Guarantee (TTG) selection of Gildan and Jerzees products and adds Hanes and Outer Banks styles to the TTG selection. The three-prong TTG program includes a price match guarantee, order fulfillment and packing guarantee and in-stock guarantee for its Alpha, Broder and NES divisions. New styles will be added to the in-stock guarantee, which previously applied to only the top three Gildan products in select colors. The in-stock guarantee states that if the company is out of stock on any applicable items, the customer will receive a five percent off coupon that can be used on any order. Visit www.broderbros.com/guarantee.