# Swags, keychains, buttons, and other promotional items?



## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

I searched the archives but I was unable to find any thread that I thought was there from last year! Could you help me? I'm looking for that old thread loaded with links to places where authors could order custom charms, trinkets, buttons, USB drives, keychains, swags, etc. with their book cover or author brand on them. IIRC there was even a post where someone had a wrap around his/her car?

If the thread doesn't exist anymore, here's my question: Where do you go to make a 2.25" button (that you can wear on your shirt) with your book info on it e.g. for your beta readers, influencers, and street team to wear? Thanks!


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## Christine Reyes (Mar 20, 2013)

I always use stickersandmore.com for promo items. They're quick, easy to work with and pretty reasonably priced. I've never ordered buttons, but they have the 2.25" size.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

Christine Reyes said:


> I always use stickersandmore.com for promo items. They're quick, easy to work with and pretty reasonably priced. I've never ordered buttons, but they have the 2.25" size.


Cool! Thanks! I just saw that they sell 100 2.25" buttons for $55 i.e. 55c per button. That's $2 LESS than CafePress per button!

Have you gotten tee-shirts from them? Is the quality pretty good? Some of my writer friends and I are trying to get our group logo printed on a shirt... I can't believe Stickers & More only charges $8.40 per tee-shirt for 2-color logo.


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## Christine Reyes (Mar 20, 2013)

JanThompson said:


> Cool! Thanks! I just saw that they sell 100 2.25" buttons for $55 i.e. 55c per button. That's $2 LESS than CafePress per button!
> 
> Have you gotten tee-shirts from them? Is the quality pretty good? Some of my writer friends and I are trying to get our group logo printed on a shirt... I can't believe Stickers & More only charges $8.40 per tee-shirt for 2-color logo.


I know, right?

I've only ordered flyers/postcards and wristbands from them, and the quality has always been amazing. I have no doubt that their t-shirts will be the same. They list the brands that they use on their page, if you want to get an idea for what the shirt itself will be like.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

Christine Reyes said:


> I know, right?
> 
> I've only ordered flyers/postcards and wristbands from them, and the quality has always been amazing. I have no doubt that their t-shirts will be the same. They list the brands that they use on their page, if you want to get an idea for what the shirt itself will be like.


I am so excited about this. I so appreciate your telling me about it.

What kind of flyers did you get? Are they for your books for launch days?


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Christine Reyes said:


> I always use stickersandmore.com for promo items. They're quick, easy to work with and pretty reasonably priced. I've never ordered buttons, but they have the 2.25" size.


Thanks for this link. Here is the email I just sent them:

Have you considered setting up print-on-demand T-shirt service so that self-published authors could sell T-shirts through their Amazon.com author pages? You would get the orders through Amazon and ship directly to the end customer, so your price would have to come up a bit. You could charge $20 per shirt, I think. The author would set the print up using promo materials he or she arranged. I would go for it. Would you be able to silk screen my book covers onto T-shirts? Here is my Amazon author page so you can see what my book covers look like. http://www.amazon.com/Cherise-Kelley/e/B009477BMA/ I'm only interested in selling T-shirts for my Dog Aliens books. I would actually probably use the header of my website for the T-shirt, which you can see at www.dogaliens.com


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

What a cool idea, Cherise! I hope they take up on that great idea! POD tee-shirts!!


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## ChrisWard (Mar 10, 2012)

There's a place called Zazzle which does cool promo type stuff. I set up an account once. The problem was that because I live in Japan postage etc was restrictively expensive unless I ordered in the kind of bulk that I had no use for. Love that kind of stuff though.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

JanThompson said:


> What a cool idea, Cherise! I hope they take up on that great idea! POD tee-shirts!!


Thanks for saying it's a cool idea. I hope they go for it, too, or that some other outfit sees this post and lets us know they are up for it. 

FYI swag = custom charms, trinkets, buttons, USB drives, keychains, etc.


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## beccaprice (Oct 1, 2011)

for book charms, I go to Southwest Sky Jewelry ([email protected]) - I have a little necklace where I've put charms of all my book covers. I don't wear it often, only to sales events, but it's fun to have. When I have a table, I also have a small bowl of book charms, not only of my own books, but other books with fairy tale themes. They're very reasonably priced.


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## Jana DeLeon (Jan 20, 2011)

If you want bulk buttons, then try One Inch Round. The top price is .55 for an order of 100, but it goes down from there. And it counts for multiple graphics on the buttons, not all the same. So if you and a buddy wanted to go in and split the cost, you may be able to save on a large multi-order. 

I use GotPrint for everything paper and the quality is excellent. They are quite literally half the cost of PrintPlace, which I thought was good before. 

T-shirts are pricey at either Zazzle or Cafe Press. I think the quality of the tees at Cafe Press is better. Sign up for both and watch for discounts. They're always sending them out, then you can get one-offs at a discount. If you're looking to get a lot of t-shirts, you're better off finding a screen-printer to do the order. I just did 150 good quality tees with full-color printing for about $1k.


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## K. D. (Jun 6, 2013)

beccaprice said:


> for book charms, I go to Southwest Sky Jewelry ([email protected]) - I have a little necklace where I've put charms of all my book covers. I don't wear it often, only to sales events, but it's fun to have. When I have a table, I also have a small bowl of book charms, not only of my own books, but other books with fairy tale themes. They're very reasonably priced.


This is a nice idea!


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## Daizie (Mar 27, 2013)

JanThompson said:


> Cool! Thanks! I just saw that they sell 100 2.25" buttons for $55 i.e. 55c per button. That's $2 LESS than CafePress per button!
> 
> Have you gotten tee-shirts from them? Is the quality pretty good? Some of my writer friends and I are trying to get our group logo printed on a shirt... I can't believe Stickers & More only charges $8.40 per tee-shirt for 2-color logo.


That is amazing, for 2-color T-shirts. I will look them up.


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## Daizie (Mar 27, 2013)

Cherise Kelley said:


> Thanks for this link. Here is the email I just sent them:
> 
> Have you considered setting up print-on-demand T-shirt service so that self-published authors could sell T-shirts through their Amazon.com author pages? You would get the orders through Amazon and ship directly to the end customer, so your price would have to come up a bit. You could charge $20 per shirt, I think. The author would set the print up using promo materials he or she arranged. I would go for it. Would you be able to silk screen my book covers onto T-shirts? Here is my Amazon author page so you can see what my book covers look like. http://www.amazon.com/Cherise-Kelley/e/B009477BMA/ I'm only interested in selling T-shirts for my Dog Aliens books. I would actually probably use the header of my website for the T-shirt, which you can see at www.dogaliens.com


You can only put up items for sale with a book cover if you own the copyright for the artwork or if you purchase an Extended license.


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## Raquel Lyon (Mar 3, 2012)

I've used https://www.facebook.com/CassiesCraftCreations for some jewellery. (She might do buttons too. She's only a young girl, I think, but really nice to deal with. In fact, you just reminded me that I hadn't posted the photo on Facebook, so if you'd like to see the result, check my page!

I also have this link http://southwestskyjewelry.mysupadupa.com/collections/all in my bookmarks, that I think came from a thread on here.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Just to throw another possibility into the mix... How crafty are you? An author I shared a booth with purchased a button maker and would make her own buttons:

http://www.amazon.com/2-1-inch-Button-Machine-Parts/dp/B0042ST1MY/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1397232632&sr=8-8&keywords=button+maker
http://buttonmakers.net/index.php?cPath=60_128

She said it was super easy, just a matter of setting aside an evening to do it. She had a basket full of mini-buttons: some with quotes, some with pictures of characters, some with her bookcovers. She would sell them for $1 a piece and they sold like gangbusters.

And another site to throw into the custom print mix is Discount Mugs http://www.discountmugs.com/.


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## LeeBee (Feb 19, 2014)

Daizie said:


> You can only put up items for sale with a book cover if you own the copyright for the artwork or if you purchase an Extended license.


So you are saying that you can sell copies of the actual book with the cover on it, but not promotional items with the cover image?


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Daizie said:


> You can only put up items for sale with a book cover if you own the copyright for the artwork or if you purchase an Extended license.


Yes, thank you for pointing that out to those who may be unaware!


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

LeeBee said:


> So you are saying that you can sell copies of the actual book with the cover on it, but not promotional items with the cover image?


Read the license agreement that comes with all your stock photos or any artwork. It should specify what you can and cannot do, how much, and how often. Always get a list of stock photos from your cover artist with the site name and url they found them on and note item numbers in case the page url changes.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

I've used this site: http://www.discountmugs.com/

They are fast and inexpensive.

I bought some great tote bags that end up being less than $5 each. Plus, they'll be even cheaper when I reorder the same thing because the set-up fee is less. 

I've also bought pens, magnets, and can koozies. They've got a ton of other stuff I'll be trying, too.


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## pagegirl (Feb 3, 2014)

I recently ordered a bunch of stuff from vistaprint. I thought their prices were pretty good and I used a groupon I bought so it was a REALLY good deal. Right now there's only a groupon for invitations, but I recommend keeping your eyes peeled. Here's vistaprint: http://www.vistaprint.com


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## Daizie (Mar 27, 2013)

LeeBee said:


> So you are saying that you can sell copies of the actual book with the cover on it, but not promotional items with the cover image?


Yes, with a standard license. That's all you are paying for. You can give away things with your cover, but if you intend to sell them, you need to purchase an extended license, which can be pricey if you or your designer made a composite.


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## Brooklyn Gesher (Nov 19, 2013)

KateDanley said:


> Just to throw another possibility into the mix... How crafty are you? An author I shared a booth with purchased a button maker and would make her own buttons:
> 
> http://www.amazon.com/2-1-inch-Button-Machine-Parts/dp/B0042ST1MY/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1397232632&sr=8-8&keywords=button+maker
> http://buttonmakers.net/index.php?cPath=60_128
> ...


It is really easy to make buttons. I taught graphic design for a while and had to teach my students. All you need is the machine, a color printer and the hardware. You can buy the blanks from www.bestblanks.com and the equipment too. It may be easier than continuously ordering if you prefer DIY.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Here's a site where you can already set up print on demand T-shirts. A KBoards member set some up with some of the slogans in another thread:

http://skreened.com/indiewriters

I'm not sure if authors could use this site to feed into their Amazon author pages, but it is worth looking into. When I Googled myself on a computer I hadn't ever logged into, my Amazon author page was the first listing. The description said something like "Buy Cherise Kelley books, products, and apparel," so...


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## Kay Bratt (Dec 28, 2011)

beccaprice said:


> for book charms, I go to Southwest Sky Jewelry ([email protected]) - I have a little necklace where I've put charms of all my book covers. I don't wear it often, only to sales events, but it's fun to have. When I have a table, I also have a small bowl of book charms, not only of my own books, but other books with fairy tale themes. They're very reasonably priced.


Nancy from Southwest did my swag and she does a great job.


















[/quote]

I haven't had t-shirts made as of yet, but it is something I'm considering so will be bookmarking this thread.


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## Brooklyn Gesher (Nov 19, 2013)

KayBratt said:


> Nancy from Southwest did my swag and she does a great job.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Those mini books are adorable! Now I want to get some swag!


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)




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## PurpleSpacePirate (May 4, 2014)

It's been so long since I last delurked here I'd forgotten my log in and had to make a new account.  

Anyways, just thought I'd throw inventclothing.com into the mix for any authors in the UK looking for t-shirts. They print on demand and also drop ship to customers. We've used them on a business to business basis before now and they're not the cheapest option, but they're great quality and reliable. £9.25/9.75 for an A4 print onto a Gildan ringspun/premium ringspun, which isn't too bad for a full colour DTG print. We print on to Gildan tees ourself and the feel of the ringspuns and premiums is really nice (sadly we heat press, rather than DTG/Screen print, so can't help anyone out for screen printing book covers etc., hence the recommendation above).

For freebies and giveaways instead of merch to sell there are, of course, cheaper options. I would stay clear of tees altogether unless you can get small print runs very cheaply, and focus on things like badges etc.,

Somebody mentioned selling them on Amazon. If you wanted to sell them yourself you need to contact the Zon for permission to sell in the apparel category. They sorted it for us within a day or so, but we did have to send links to a couple of our websites for them to verify that we were in business and had a minimum of 30 products. I can't think off the top of my head of a business that will sell on the designers behalf on Amazon, although Cafepress/Zazzle might be worth looking at as they seem to have their entire inventory up there. Not sure how they work the commission for Zon sales but could be worth looking into as an easy option, and to give you access to the mugs and everything else they print. 

I created some merchandise for an indie film a while back, and sold it for them on Zon etc., on a 50/50 profit split basis, so it might be worth contacting small/indie printing businesses close to home and seeing if they would strike a similar deal. Sales were very, very low though, so brace yourself for that possibility.

Another option, if you have an author website, is to throw up something like a Magento store and handle sales yourself. Fairly simple to do but might be overkill for one t-shirt!

Right, I'm off to lurk under that rock over there for another two years.


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## GUTMAN (Dec 22, 2011)

http://www.wackybuttons.com/prices.php

Love this company.


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## kklawiter (Jan 23, 2012)

Daizie said:


> You can only put up items for sale with a book cover if you own the copyright for the artwork or if you purchase an Extended license.


I don't think there was enough emphasis on this. You can not sell any swag with you covers on it (or parts of) without the extended stock licenses. Most cover artists only purchase the standard licenses unless otherwise discussed. Trust me, you would know if you paid for extended licensing. Even if you purchased or think you purchased the full copyright, ask your cover artist what licensing they used first. Unless your cover was custom illustrated, in most cases when you purchase full copyright it is for the design not the stock used. This is not an ask for forgiveness later instead of permission now scenario.

If you are unsure, please talk to your cover artist!

Now if you plan on giving away the swag, have at it!


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## KittKatt (May 4, 2014)

beccaprice said:


> for book charms, I go to Southwest Sky Jewelry ([email protected]) - I have a little necklace where I've put charms of all my book covers. I don't wear it often, only to sales events, but it's fun to have. When I have a table, I also have a small bowl of book charms, not only of my own books, but other books with fairy tale themes. They're very reasonably priced.


What a cute idea!


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## 68564 (Mar 17, 2013)

Cherise Kelley said:


>


Cool idea - how much that cost you? What are you going to do with them?


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

VydorScope said:


> Cool idea - how much that cost you? What are you going to do with them?


They cost $1.80 each for 100 double-sided, including shipping. I'm displaying them on my table at SPOCON and giving one out free if they buy my book(s), or selling one for $2 if they just need a bag to carry all the other stuff they bought.


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## 68564 (Mar 17, 2013)

Cherise Kelley said:


> They cost $1.80 each for 100 double-sided, including shipping. I'm displaying them on my table at SPOCON and giving one out free if they buy my book(s), or selling one for $2 if they just need a bag to carry all the other stuff they bought.


Too bad we are over 3,000 miles are part - or I might sneak some of my bookmarks in the bags at your table!


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## aca891 (Jan 2, 2013)

So many useful sites, I don't know where to start!


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

VydorScope said:


> Too bad we are over 3,000 miles are part - or I might sneak some of my bookmarks in the bags at your table!


It's probably a good thing you can't!


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## 68564 (Mar 17, 2013)

These came to about a quarter a piece (including shipping) from goprint.com.









(thats front and back of full color bookmark in case you can not tell)

Yoly designed them for me and I just give them away to whoever asked. Goprint has other great printed type options. Never considered shirt though.... now action figures would be really cool.


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## Rin (Apr 25, 2011)

I have my own badge machine, haven't made badges in ages though.


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## 68564 (Mar 17, 2013)

Your image links do not appear to be working...


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

VydorScope said:


> Your image links do not appear to be working...


Hm, OK! www.discountmugs.com 20% off today only, promo code 20SALE


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Print-on-demand T-shirts

http://skreened.com/content/sell-on-skreened/

You can make your T-shirts appear for sale on your website via RSS!


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## Edward Lake (Mar 11, 2012)

What about t-shirts? I had this great idea for a women's t-shirt. Black shirt with white letters that read "Adomas would have picked me." Anyone who's read episode 1 of The Mamluks Saga would get that. 

Edit: Sorry if t-shirts have already been mentioned.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Zazzle does print on demand T-shirts now, too!

http://www.zazzle.com/kaxians+gifts


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## avinkx (Oct 3, 2020)

hey

I know a website which provides promotional apparel and accessories.

I hope you will find this website good https://champu.in/

Cheers
Avinash


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