Episode 165: What Clients Care About Now with Denise Taschereau and Karie Cowden, PromoCares

Welcome to Skucast, the podcast for entrepreneurs in the promotional products industry. Skucast shines a light on our industry's best work, features maverick personalities, and discusses what's really involved in running a modern promotional products business. Skucast is the official podcast of Common Skew.

But I think people fundamentally, you know what they want is they want story. They want to feel good about what they're buying, you know, and they don't want a report that says it's phthalate-free. They want to know where it was made and what the company is like. And even today I have an email from a client and it's like, love this product, supplier story, question mark. You know, what's the story?

Hi friends, I'm Bobby LeHew, the Chief Content Officer at Commonsku. That was the voice of Denise Tashrow. I'm joined by Denise and Carrie Cowden on behalf of Promo Cares. Now, if you're familiar with Promo Cares, it's highly likely you have the wrong idea about this organization because Promo Cares is really not about a them. It's about you and the dramatically changing buying criteria that your customer is evolving into. Now, we've always been passionate advocates for purpose-driven businesses here at CommsQ. It's also why today, the conversation you're about to hear is one that could create a subtle but dynamic ripple effect in your business that touches every aspect of your work, from your employees to your customer to your supply chain partners. Diversity, equity, inclusion, responsible sourcing, sustainability, community impact, advocacy, giving back— these are no longer sideline issues for fringe customers. These are values that the world is shifting to. And when I say the world, I mean that your buyers, are asking these questions as it relates to how they spend their money with you. Now, this is one of the most important conversations we've ever had on the Skucast, and I think that's saying a lot, not because we're so special, but because the guests we've had the honor of interviewing have been exceptionally open and caring and passionate about real entrepreneurial growth. Before we get into this episode, you might have heard that SkuCon registration is now open. And in case you're new to the Skucast, What's SKUCon? Well, we wanted to create a virtual conference that would mirror our in-person events with intimate connections and real conversations while bringing together the brightest minds to think over the biggest challenges. Because you really don't need just another virtual business conference. You need an experience that will revolutionize your thinking, help you find that inner grit, and challenge you to rise higher, go deeper, and reach further than you ever have. So Join us on January 7th as we change not just yourself, not just your team, but join us as we seek to change the world. Yes, you heard me right. Seth Godin is one of our honored keynotes, as well as my friend Anna Hanley and some of the brightest emerging voices today. You can learn more and secure your tickets now at skucon.com. Now back to the episode. Denise Tashrow is Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Fareware, where she is responsible for business development product sourcing, as well as Farewell's ethical sourcing and sustainability programs. Denise got the idea to launch Farewell when she noticed how difficult it was to source promotional merchandise that reflected the social and environmental priorities of many of the brands and organizations she admired. Carrie Cowden is the founder of Connect the Dots Promotion. Connect the Dots was just named number 6 in the fastest growing promotional products distributors by Promo Marketing Magazine for 2019. She accidentally fell into the promo world in 1996 Her promo journey is prolific. She's seen the industry from every angle, starting with Holt Marketing, then Barlowe, BIC, Vantage, and in 2008, the PPAI Board of Directors. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Here's Denise and Carrie on behalf of Promocares.org. Let's kick off our conversation starting with the customer. The customer today is increasingly more conscientious, more sensitive to where they source, how they source, what impact sourcing has on the planet in macro and on their community specifically. What changes and demands are you both seeing in the customer that Promocare addresses? Carrie, let's start with you and then we'll turn to Denise.

I would say it's kind of like pushing a boulder up a hill, and I started noticing it in my distributorship because I noticed the t-shirts becoming brand fill because there's too many logos and you wear it once and you give it to Goodwill, which is a great place to go. But, and the realistic huge part of this is we want to give product that makes a difference and has purpose behind it and is utilitarian. And so I already had started shifting clients to moving more towards buy less of something, make it higher quality and pay more for it but the impact that you're going to have is bigger. So, we already started seeing that trend probably in the last couple of years. I would say with COVID and all this wonderful pandemic we're in, I would say that my clients are uber-focused on spending less money. So, the conversation becomes actually easier to talk to them about quality and spending less.

As a distributor, I was in an oil and gas market. I had a different type of clientele than you have, Carrie, and certainly a different type of clientele than Denise has. But Denise, I'm curious, from what you've been focusing on throughout your career targeting a very conscientious client, how have you seen the customer change?

You know, it's interesting, Kerry, that you say you're seeing people, the conversation around quality get easier. And I was just explaining that the other day in the very same way, in the sense that through COVID, for example, a lot of folks aren't doing those kind of street activations, the events, the conferences, the trade shows, those, those lower-cost giveaways, you know, the I need 1,000 things under $2. Kind of calls and they're taking a step back and saying, well, I still have budget. I still want to engage with my clients or my employees or whomever is important to me. And I want to do it in a different way. I'm not going to bundle up a $2 thing and put it in the mail. That's not the experience I want to have with them. So I'm going to create these beautiful kits or projects. And I think a lot of our industry is moving towards that, but it's been particularly useful for those of us who are trying to bring sustainable products in or more impact-focused products into the, into the conversation. So it's very similar to Kerry in that way. But what I would say I'm seeing with our clients who are already deep in the weeds on these issues is a level of specificity that I haven't seen in a while in the sense of asking for really focused impact conversations. And I'll give you some examples, you know, working with some larger brands on gifting programs for the holidays. And we're getting asked for things like, could you have any Black-owned, minority-owned suppliers in your roster? That we can support because we want to drive change right now. There's racial unrest in the US. How can we leverage our spend to address an issue like that? And so I'd say like folks are getting more precise with what they're asking and connecting the dots to the kind of change they can drive with their spend in a way that I don't know that I've seen a lot of in the past. So I, and I'm finding it quite inspiring.

Do you see them looking further down the line too, or looking in both directions, both in terms of sourcing, but also the impact their purchasing has on their specific community? Whether their community is global or local?

Yeah, I mean, I think there's a couple of things. There's that idea that they should have more control over where things are coming from. I think we can, you know, we'll probably talk about this, you know, over the course of this conversation around transparency and expectation of transparency that I think is an emerging trend. But I think people fundamentally, you know, what they want is they want story. They want to feel good about what they're buying, you know, and they don't want a port that says it's phthalate-free. They want to know where it was made and what the company is like. And even today I have an email from a you know, clients, and it's like, love this product— supplier story? You know, what's the story? And I think that's what people are looking for. They're looking for connection with their products, with the supply chains, with us as distributors, with our suppliers. And that's where I think, you know, Promocares can really, really lend a hand is start to amplify those stories, bring them to this market so that we can all share them with our customers when they do ask.

Promocare has evolved. If you've heard about Promocare before, you may not even recognize how much richer and broader the emphasis is now on the demands of the future client and making us a more conscientious supply chain to meet those demands. There are now 4 primary passions that Promocare codifies for the market. Denise, can you elaborate on how these priorities have changed and what they mean for us and our customer today?

Sure. I think Promocare started with a desire of a group of folks to get together and raise some awareness and kind of elevate the industry industry, you know, when we think back, I think it was last year, the Fast Company article came out around, you know, don't spend $20 billion on crap or whatever the title was, but it was something like that. And, you know, there was a desire to elevate the good in the industry and help people find a pathway to the good in the industry. And the initial focus from what I understand, and Kerry, hop in here because I just started to get involved earlier this year, was more on the, you know, the give back kind of category, like supporting suppliers that were giving back to their community. So not necessarily as focused on the products that we're making, where they're made, how they're made, what they're made from, but great charitable community-focused suppliers. So I think that was a part of the original foundation of the organization. And I think as we started to dig into what does it mean to be good in the world as a business, as a distributor, as a supplier, we started to identify these 4 core areas that we thought if we could bring content to and education and tactics and tips and hacks, could kind of elevate motivate us all. And what we landed on, and this is an evolving conversation, like it was 5 until about 10 minutes ago, and then now it's 4, but literally at our last board meeting, we were kind of struggling with this. But what we've landed on is really 4 core areas. And one is responsible sourcing. Like, how are the workers treated in the supply chain where our products are made? Are the products safe for the consumer's hands that they get into? Ethical sourcing, ensuring that our factory base, the manufacturers that our supply chain leans on, are treating workers with respect, and at a minimum meeting international labor standards. So that's one area, you know, PPAI has been doing work in this, in both these areas of kind of product responsibility and ethical sourcing. Lots of tools there, lots of resources there for us in the industry. The second bucket that's emerged, an area that's emerged, and I think it's just been amplified this year, is diversity, equity, inclusion. And I think it's something that we're talking a lot more about as an industry and ensuring that our industry reflects the communities we live in and that folks that are coming from minority communities, communities are treated with respect and welcome and just a functioning part of our industry. And we are addressing as an industry the issues that many of our communities in both Canada and the US are facing in a positive way. The third area is sustainability. You know, anybody who knows me knows this is a really big passion of mine. You know, what are the environmental impacts of our products? What can we be doing in our offices to reduce our impacts as distributors, whether it's recycling or composting or, you know, giving your staff a place to park their bikes, whatever it might be. And then that, that fourth area is that foundational area of community impact, social impact, give back. Like, how are we contributing to better communities and supporting all of the organizations doing the heavy lifting in the nonprofit sector, for example? So those are the kind of the four areas that we've landed on. You know, there's kind of a new little thing we've started to chat about around advocacy and what could we all do to lend our voice as business leaders to the issues that are important to us. But those are, I think, are the four core areas that we're starting to shape content around. And education around and resources around to share out in the broader industry.

Yeah. Carrie, do you want to comment on that?

I just thought about Sessions at Home that Common Skew put on a couple of weeks ago, and it was talking about what's your differentiator. And in our industry, it's very easy to get lost and commoditized. And to me, as a distributor, I look at it and think, oh my gosh, this is a great way to differentiate. And especially with everything going on, you know, that's something that as a business owner, I want to look at and make sure all my people know.. And it's, it's showing up for the world and showing up for the industry. It's a beautiful thing. And I think Promocares exists so that we can help. And you don't have to be a $6 million distributorship. You don't have to be a $100,000 distributorship. It's all of our responsibilities. And what little things can you do to make a difference in any of those 4 buckets? That's what we're asking for.

You know what I love about this too, is that for a distributor, we've needed a new framework for partner selection for a long time. The industry seems to be in the dark ages when it comes to how we choose our supplier partners. It's typically based on the very rudimentary aspects like can they get the products on time? Is it full of lead and poison? I mean, our baseline is pretty low from where we start. And I've always wanted a framework that I can turn to my team and say, here is our selection process for how we choose our supplier partners based on competence. Yes, but also partners that reflect our core values. So as a distributor, I don't have to reinvent the wheel. I can adopt these principles that you've outlined here as key sourcing principles And I think it just gives us a more beautiful framework from which to make more conscientious decisions. What's your favorite distributor story of someone who has fully integrated some or all of these principles?

Carrie, do you want to go first? Well, mine's kind of awkward because Denise is like my hero. I mean, when I met her in January, I had no idea of all the things. It makes you want to be a better person in so many ways. And I kind of got to this point in my decisions on who I use as suppliers and then who— what I offer up for my, my clients is like, what would Denise do? Like, where is this going to end up? Like, I never asked those questions before. And if they're walking the walk, I mean, Fair Wear is like— it should be a beacon for all of us just to look at that and think, what could we do differently? Honestly, that Denise, that's my girl.

Denise and Sarah have always been my industry crush too. I was talking to Simone from Merchery out of Belgium, and I asked him, are you familiar with Fair Wear? And he said, oh yeah. So the impact is worldwide. Denise, do you have a favorite distributor story?

Well, I literally just Googled Merchery this morning because I saw them on the SkiCon, um, thing. I was like, oh my goodness. I sent it to my business partner. I'm like, check out these guys, look at their manifesto, it's so inspiring. Um, I feel like I have like old school, new school. So old school for me, I love John Borg. He's with Eco Imprints in San Francisco. Known him forever, you know, became friends early on. And there's nothing better than being friends with competitors. Like, it is literally the best thing you can do as a business owner is have the courage to call your competition up and have beers with them or ciders or wine or whatever it is. And I really like him because he's been at it for a long time. He's really authentic, he's innovative in the space, and he just sort of like evokes a passion for driving people in the right direction that I've always, I've always admired. He has a very hilarious shrine to Steve Jobs in his office that if you are ever in San Francisco and can go visit, it's like one of the coolest offices I've been. And then, you know, people like Mercury, Harper Scott, you know, brands that I don't know, I don't know, I don't know the founders or the owners, but I certainly follow them and look at them and watch what they're doing. And I'm, I'm really inspired in kind of a sense of like a modern aesthetic a kind of future-focused brand that's taking sustainability to the masses in a really cool way. I worry sometimes that we can end up being a bit crunch crunch granola or flavor of the month, like green products, and it's like, oh great, it comes in green and brown and gray, right? So finding brands that I think are bringing beautiful product to market is where I look to.

And those are some of the, so those are some of the names I think of.

How about suppliers, Denise? Oh, you know, it's a long list. And again, I tend to think of like categories of suppliers. So there's some incredible niche suppliers, you know, love Bottle. I love Mere. You know, Topo Designs are some great, you know, kind of great brands in our industry. But I've been looking a lot more at like the larger players and what are they doing and where are they getting to? And, you know, I had a call just, just this week with the compliance person at Cap America, for example, and we had this really incredible call around just where they're looking to go more broadly, you know, beyond compliance. So whether it's a lighting retrofit in their office and managing, you know, their waste streams for greater diversion rates, you know, in their offices in the US compared to worrying about the lead in the in the dyes and the products themselves. So, I think there's an emerging body of these kind of niche sustainable suppliers, Allmade and E-Conscious, Royal Apparel. Those are some of our favorite apparel suppliers. But I'm actually really interested in seeing what's Gemline doing? What's Leeds doing? What's HIT doing? Where are these leaders because of scale in our industry? And in that light, I always point point to SanMar. Like, whenever I'm talking to a big supplier, I'm like, go look at what SanMar's do and, and do more of that because they tell good stories. They're telling you what they're doing in a really technical way from a compliance perspective, but then they just throw in like some great photos and, and good stories. And that's what we need to sell. And I think, you know, Carrie, I know we've chatted about this before, but, um, you know, for the suppliers who might be listening to this, it's like we have to sit down at a table and try and convince our clients that you're the fit for them. And you don't do that by sliding a product safety report across the table and saying, well, these guys don't break the law. Like, it's just not that inspiring, right? So, so I'm here. So for me, when you talk about suppliers, like, I'm really looking to the leaders to say, you know, let's, let's evolve how you're showing up in the marketplace with your story. So that we can tell it and convince our customers that, you know, why we like you and why we use you.

So Denise, you mentioned scale, and I think it's such an important conversation for us to have because when you think in these buckets, ethical sourcing, sustainability, diversity, equality, particularly the bucket of sustainability, we think of a particular type of client and maybe we think of that client as a sustainability-driven company. But when you look at some of the budgets we had and as a distributor, and they might be spending $1 million on merchandise. That oil and gas company might be spending $1 million on merchandise. The fact that you can work with a buyer who is inside that organization, who personally wants to buy based on stronger personal values, who has this budget that they are accountable for. If you can shift that spend at scale from an organization like that, you can really make an impact with the least type of sustainable customers that you can imagine. And I think in our industry, we categorize the company clients into categories of people who care about sustainability versus those who don't. The whole conversation now is shifting with all types of buyers.

You know, in the flip side of that is I think sometimes people underestimate the power they have even when they're a one-person shop. You know, you're choosing your courier company. Like our courier company, the entire fleet is run on hybrids or electric vehicles. So we know every time we're getting a, you know, a job sent to a local client, we're doing it in a way that has less of an impact than if we were just calling up the random courier company, right? Um, when you cater, cater, you know, we, we launched in New York last year and we got the list of approved caterers for the Canadian consulate and there was no one on that list that served organic coffee or organic food. And we're like, we can't launch our brand in New York with like crappy coffee. Like it's just like, it's not going to work, right? Like we need to connect these dots. It's our story. It's our brand. And so they were like, that's a, well, yeah, we hadn't really thought of that. Okay, great. And we ended up, you know, helping onboard a,, like, all local food, natural food, vegan caterer to the Canadian consulate. And that's who catered our event. And now they're an approved caterer for the Canadian consulate. And, like, it's a simple little thing. And it just— what triggered it is we couldn't get fair trade organic coffee. And it just felt like a miss for us as a brand to launch our US company with terrible coffee. So, so it's not, you know, it's one person, one phone call, literally. So I think sometimes Because, you know, we do, you know, to Kerry's point, it doesn't matter if you're a $100,000 a year company or $6 million or $60 million. You have an enormous amount of power every time you choose to spend something. And that's the, you know, you can imagine what our client meetings sound like. They sound like this. Like we're constantly trying to inspire people to just pivot their pen in a new direction to sign off on an order that has, you know, is going to make the world just like a marginally tiny little bit better, you know, and it's an empowering act, right? So, and again, it doesn't matter how big the check is. It's just the fact that you're signing it in the right direction.

And what a rich conversation to have with customers. Carrie, do you have a favorite supplier story?

We talk about, you know, first of all, the big guys and how they need to be leaders in this whole realm. And I think that's a lot of why Promocares exists because I think every conversation that we have with our suppliers now is, what do you do for products that give back? What do you do about sustainability? What about your packaging? And I'm asking all these questions. So the importance of our large suppliers in our industry educating their salespeople all the way through is super important. And I had a conversation with one of them at a, you know, trunk or treat kind of thing out last, last week. And I said, well, what are you doing? She said, well, we do this and this and this. And I said, okay, well, where? I don't see anything. It's not even on your website. And she's like, oh. So she got a hold of marketing and the next day it was all on their website. And I'm like, I think that's what Promo Cares is going to exist for, to be like, you guys are already doing this and it's important. It's part of the conversation we all have to have. And all the way down to your salespeople that are out there with your megaphone, they need to understand it and they need to share it and they need to educate the distributors. And then in turn, they can, they can work with the clients.

Oh, I love what you said times 10. Yeah, yeah. Your salespeople have to know your story too. Like it's what you said times 10.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it has to be a value that everyone agrees with. But I will say, like, talk about, you know, that doesn't naturally make sense where they're not, you know, quote unquote, a crunchy brand. Maple Ridge Farms, they're a food company and they just have gotten behind all of the promo cares things. And they have sustainability, social responsibility, company community outreach. They're going out and they're just being kind and doing Habitat for Humanity, or they even have like a bunch of their seasonal workers come in and knit a half hour before they go into the floor to do packaging. Just, just those little things. It's so inspiring to hear that because you don't have to be one of the big ones to put on your website and splash it and have all these corporate trainings. It can just be simple. Just simple.

Take a step.

Do something. Amen. Carrie? Shifting back to distributors for a second, how does a distributor today actionably adopt the promo care principles? I mean, does it start with developing criteria for sourcing value-driven products. I mean, where do we start and what can we do? Carrie, do you want to keep going since you're already occupying the pulpit?

Like, I just— our website from Promocares, again, all volunteer-led. We're working on it. Um, but yeah, promocares.org, we really hope to have come, you know, a toolbox where you can look and see all these different things that you can do. And then as suppliers, the important thing for suppliers is getting their information up through all the search tools that we have, whether it be ESP Online, Sage, Sage has been working with us and they've been awesome to work with because they're really thinking through, you know, the importance of when I go out to find that product as a distributor, because I've had this conversation with my client, I need to be able to find and source these things without going to 50 different websites. I want to go on to Sage and say, I need something that will be a product with purpose and I want it to support goldfish or Red Goldfish. You should go buy the book to Roger Burnett's most recent, uh, SKU Cast. But I don't know, there's a billion different ways and there are some amazing people on this board and all you have to do is click on Promocares.org and I think, you know, we'll improve that as we go. But you got to just take a step is what I would say.

Well, I want to add to that too. I don't think folks should wait around for all the search tools to kick in for wider criteria like values-based searching because that's a very big ship to turn and waiting around for that I mean, I don't mean to be mean, but it might be a lazy response to this as opposed to something you can enact in your organization because what you can do with your team and your clients around igniting the energy around purpose, it's phenomenal and we shouldn't wait.

I just see you take a breath like, "I have something to say." Let's go. No, and I think I appreciate that you're saying that because I think that's a really useful kind of observation is it's not, it's not going to come to you, it's not going to be handed up, like you have to decide you want to do it. And I think, I think, you know, as leaders in your organization, as individuals within an organization, if you're, even if your leadership isn't driving this, you can just choose and start to do it. And I think, you know, it does, the most obvious place to start is with product and is with suppliers and looking for better product, looking for better suppliers. And, and to do that, it's really about asking questions. And I always bring it back to just ask questions. And I would suggest, if you were to start, if you are more than one person, sit down with the other people in your organization, whether in small teams or if you're small enough, just sit down, do a virtual call, whatever you're gonna do, and say, I've been thinking about this, like, what do you think? What could we do? Where should we start? What are we doing doing and start to make lists of the things that you're already doing. You might have, you know, you might find out that the team in the back is like saving, recycling all the packaging. You might find out that the person who deals with your sample room/pile of shame of samples, old samples, is donating it to local homeless shelters at the end of every year. Like you might not even know half of what's going on. So start by asking questions of your team. Start by asking questions of your clients to understand what's important to them and whether it's important to them. Ask them if they have a social responsibility program But most importantly, start to have the conversations, as Kerry noted, with your suppliers and just say, what are you doing? And, you know, I have the perfect example from about a week, 2 weeks ago maybe, where we do a lot of patches. We do a lot of patches for a very beloved outdoor retailer. And I started thinking about those patches, and I know the factory is good, and we have a lot of information about the supply chain, but I started thinking about the thread, and I talked to my sales rep and I said, wouldn't it be awesome if we could get a, like, certified recycled called Thread for all these patches we're doing. So that is a damn good idea. Let's get on that. I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna get back to you next week. And he comes back to me next week, but he comes back to me with a Global Recycled Standard certification letter. And the threads were transitioned about 18 months ago, um, and we had been building patches with recycled thread for 18 months for this client and not knowing it. I didn't I didn't know it. My sales rep didn't know it. But somewhere down in the channel, their buyer and their product developers had made a transition. And to me, that was the perfect example of, like, an absolutely incredible story that would have never seen the light of day had I not started asking about it. So I think, you know, you'd be surprised what you find out when you ask and then you ask your sales reps to ask. And I think that's what it's going to take to move the dial forward is just simply asking questions and seeing what you find out and writing it down and making sure that your sales team knows about it if you're a distributor so they can share it up to the clients. Because that's what it's about. It's tying the clients to the product at the end of the day.

I was just thinking, and then toot your own horn, that would be all I would ask because I think you've got someone in the sample room and they're already going and they're recycling or they're already going and they're giving it back somewhere. And you've got all these awesome rich stories that will again differentiate you. It's a sales strategy. It's not just something that makes you feel good. It's something that you should really weave in and know what's going on in your company and then share it. Let everybody know about it. And it's nothing to be shamed about. It only helps elevate our whole industry.

Tell the story. I love that you said that. You know, Mike McCallowat spoke at Sessions.

I love him, by the way.

Yeah, he's amazing. He talked about having the best product and his product is, of course, his books and his speaking. And one of his mentors said, that if you have the best product, you better have the best marketing. I mean, we tend to make assumptions that when we do these things, particularly values-driven things, that eyeballs and attention are going to come to us based on the merit of our action. But they're not. I mean, we need to put as much energy and passion behind marketing that message as we do our products. And that goes for distributors and suppliers.

Exactly.

Now I'm going to shift our focus just a little bit. I'm going to ask a big question. I know it's a big question. We all understand sustainability and how, as a stepping stone, we can enter the world of values-driven selling through the avenue of sustainability. But let's talk about advocacy for a moment. I mean, how can we as distributors practically embrace and enact advocacy for causes that we believe in?

Denise, do you want to tackle that one? Well, it's something we're pretty versed in at Fareware, and it's a fundamental part of what we see our role as as business leaders. And for us, it's around what are the issues that are important to us? So I'll speak from a personal perspective. Climate, climate change is a, is a very, very important issue to me. And so I've chosen to kind of put some of my leadership chops towards moving the dial on that. So for example, last year, when there was the global climate strike with Greta Thunberg, I worked through the B Corp community, which is a sustainability framework that some businesses are certified by. And I called probably like 70, or outreach by email to 70, 75 CEOs in Canada and said, let's take a stand and shut your doors and get your staff out to the climate change and support your local organizers by saying, I'm a business voice and I'll go on media, I'll speak to whoever you want to about why it's important as an entrepreneur and as a job creator in my community to take a stand on this issue. And we were able to mobilize in Canada, and we were in partnership with the US, a really big business support for the climate strike last year. So that would be like a really practical example. It's an issue that's important to me. I recognize that it might not be everybody's issue, but it's an example of, I can show up at a local city meeting in my community, or I can kind of show up anywhere, and I can be the mom and the bike rider and the environmentalist, and, or I can show up and be a business leader and, and talk about some of these issues. And I think back to a friend of mine who used to work at Timberland and ended up doing some lobbying on climate in DC and went to, you know, Senator in New Hampshire and said, yeah, you know, I'm from Timberland and, you know, progressive climate policy is important to us. And he said, well, we, you know, we have business lobbyists in here all all day long talking about energy policy, but we have never, ever had a brand come in here and talk about a progressive climate, you know, forward-thinking agenda on this issue. And I think we were underestimating the role that we can play as progressive business leaders in shifting the dial legislatively on these critical issues. So things like packaging legislation, things like the racial inequity, things like— there's lot, you know, living wage. There's so many things going on in our community, at state, at federal, at provincial levels, that when you show up with this particular, particular hat we all wear, we can move the dial. And I feel really, I feel obviously really strongly about it. But I think it's a, it's, it is probably the biggest trend I see in the brands that we work with, is many of our biggest clients and most beloved clients are using their voices politically to drive change.

On really critical, important issues.

Carrie, what are your thoughts on this? I would say connection more than ever is super important to people. And as business leaders and voices, even just for our industry alone, we kind of almost have a commitment. We have to do this, in my mind. But I would say showing up authentically is extremely important. Denise is very into climate change and you can hear her passion. I can't say that that's something that makes me super excited or seem sexy, or do I want to go lobby? No, it's not something that excites me. But as a business leader, I know that's something that I need to do. It's something that I was put on this earth to do. So I would say the biggest thing with advocacy is showing up authentically, making sure you know your stuff before going in, and then maybe even finding some friends in the industry that can go along with you that have the same views because it's always better together and that connection can be there too.

And I think I just have one more thing to say, 'cause you asked, is I actually think it's one of the bigger risks in our industry is ensuring that the associations that represent our industry are not lobbying and putting their legislative efforts and their weight into their legislative initiatives. To drive change in the wrong direction. And I think, you know, as we are fighting so hard to elevate the reputation of our industry, we have to be very careful that we're not, you know, on the other hand or in another room lobbying to re-erode, you know, legislative frameworks that are kind of, you know, pushing, you know, humanity forward, right? And I think a little bit about the SWAG Act, and I think it's kind of a ridiculous act and there's, You can fight it tooth and nail, or you can inform it and say, well, maybe there needs to be a framework that ensures our industry isn't producing, creating, and distributing crap product. Like, maybe that's what the conversation should be rather than digging our heels in and saying, like, kind of, how dare you? It's like, well, you know, maybe we should listen to a perception that we're putting brand fill, as Jamie Mayer would say, out into the world. Maybe we need to adapt a little bit and respond in a different way. So I just, I put that out there as a bit of a risk, and I did say it publicly in front of Paul Ballantyne once too.

So I love that we have to be open to counterpoint and, and not just get offended by contrary opinion about our profession so that we can find the kernel of truth within an opposing viewpoint, even if it's somewhat erroneous. Genius. Okay, final question. We started our conversation today with the client, and I want to end it talking about the client. How do we engage our clients in this conversation? How do we practically demonstrate our work in this and engage them in supporting the mission?

Carrie, you first.

Sure.

We were just involved with an RFP with someone that touts sustainability as their core value, and they were asking for plaque. And we reached out to the procurement officer and said, um, what? Like, do you want bamboo or something sustainable, or do you want to do something that maybe would make the Earth better rather than make another thing that will collect dust and has no use? Uh, not that there's anything against plaques. Nothing against plaques. Nothing against plaques. But, um, we have to change the conversation, and we have to be educated sellers and purveyors of all these promotional items to know when to say no and when to say maybe we could have a conversation and you could understand maybe this isn't the best thing because we have to be brand advocates for them. It's not just putting a logo on a pen anymore. It's a lot bigger than that. So I would say being educated and then having the conversation and asking why, just like Denise was saying, what are the questions that we have to Denise, how about you?

I think a really good sort of tip for people, distributors and suppliers too, is to start to put more detail in your product description. So we try to not let our account managers send presentations and quotes out the door without changing the product copy. So, you know, you pull out of, you know, Sage or ESP and you get the bump that's in the catalog or whatever has been put in there. And often you're in a hurry, you're just trying to get these presentations out the door and you send it out and If you're lucky, you remember to put, you know, delete the blank product from, from SanMar and, you know, alpha or whatever comes in there. And then if people are like, oh, it's blank, I thought I had one color on it anyways. But, but so we really try to coach our team into adding story to the product and/or details. So country of origin, you know, what the material is made from or how we feel like it might fit their campaign. So kind of bring the stories to life through product descriptions. And, you know, I added a product to a presentation this morning from a supplier that's not in our inventory. Industry, and when I copied over the product description, it had, um, the— it had the country of origin in it, it had the, the number of the national number of the factory, um, so that you could locate the factory, and it had the number of workers in it. Um, and like, imagine if our industry, um— I cut and pasted that. I didn't dig, I didn't ask, I literally cut and pasted it from their catalog. So I think that's where I'd love to see the industry go, and I think there's ways you can work around it. Um, but even, even transparency around country of origin, it seems like such a little thing, but I would love it if our search engines would just have that populated. Um, it would save us a lot of time, for example. But, but I think that's a really simple one, is just be more transparent with your, um, clients and tell them where their stuff's coming from or what it's made from. Um, I think that's the biggest tip I would share.

I mentioned this on the Merchery podcast with Simone, that he publishes on his website that his product is made in China, and for years in this business We've worked to hide that fact or diminish it, but the customer is expecting an honesty and transparency that no longer hides. Denise, Carrie, thank you both. You're such dear friends of the CommsCue community, and you're both so loved by the CommsCue team. Thank you for your leadership, and to the entire board, thank you for your work on our behalf.

Great. Thanks for having us. Yeah, and, you know, get over to Promocares.org. We're evolving that website over the coming months. I think we're hoping it will be a good resource for folks and will drive some change in the industry.

Thanks so much for tuning in to this episode of SkuCast. Be sure to keep up with our latest content by subscribing to SkuCast on iTunes or to our blog at community.commsku.com. Until next time, friends, thanks so much for listening.