PPB November 2019

Serious Sippers G o to any meeting—whether it’s for work, school, church, your community or a professional or volunteer organization— and you will notice that nearly everyone has brought along a reusable beverage container. It takes planning and preparation to carry reusable drinkware, but many people choose it over adding their empties to the plastic recycle bin. Environmental Influences According to data from National Geographic , plastic bottles and bottle caps are the third and fourthmost-collected plastic trash in the Ocean Conservancy’s annual beach cleanups. As a result of environmental awareness about the pollution caused by single-use bottles, the disposable plastic water bottle has become more of a nuisance than a convenience. The same push for environmentally-friendly bottles is also influencing the demand for reusable straws, such as those made of stainless steel. “The push to rid the world of single-use straws has created a big market for the industry that you don’t want tomiss out on,” says Krista Ward, director of marketing for St. Petersburg, Florida-based supplier Hit Promotional Products. Drinkware Delivers Reusable drinkware is not only on trend and in demand for consumers, but it can deliver a significant number of impressions at a very low cost when used as a promotional product to enhance brand exposure. “Drinkware’s return on investment is huge, with 1,400 impressions costing as little as half a cent each over the product’s lifetime,” says Carrie Lewis, marketing/communicationmanager for Dr i nkwa r e by Brittany Glenn Thanks to the movement toward products that are reusable and crafted from sustainable materials, promotional drinkware is poised at the sweet spot for success. 48 | NOVEMBER 2019 | GROW