Sustainability Sustainable products have become a staple in promo, as evidenced by the $3.8 billion in estimated sales they represented in 2025, which made up 14% of total sales. However, its growth slowed in 2025, while it continues to be something to watch going forward, with compliance and regulation matters putting greater emphasis on it. Sustainability has become a baseline expectation for some, and the areas of growth are driven by compliance and buyer requirement. “Sustainability has shifted from a fast-growth category to a standard offering across distributor sizes,” Bhat says. Online Sales Makes Up A Quarter Of Revenue Just about any thriving distributor would agree that the days of online sales being considered a growth experiment are well in the past. They are now a core channel of the promo market, and the data backs that up. • Online sales reached $7.1 billion in 2025, or 26.3% of total sales. Nearly all large distributors and most small ones sell online. Distributors under $2.5 million reported an 11.4% online sales growth in 2025, suggesting that digital sales channels play a major role in the scale and reach of smaller firms. $1.4B $4.7B $6.0B $1.1B $4.3B $5.4B $1.2B $3.3B $5.4B $1.2B $2.2B $3.4B $1.5B $4.2B $5.7B $1.9B $3.2B $5.0B $2.5B $4.3B $6.8B $2.8B $4.3B $7.1B 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2023 2024 2025 8 6 4 2 0 ($bn) Online Sales Contributions To Distributor Business, 2017-2025 ■ Under $2.5M ■ Over $2.5M $1.1B $1.2B $2.3B $1.4B $1.4B $2.8B $1.1B $1.3B $2.4B $1.5B $1.4B $2.9B $1.7B $1.4B $3.1B $3.2B $1.9B $3.7B $4.3B $1.7B $3.8B 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 4 3 2 1 0 ($bn) Sustainable Products Sales Contribution To Distributor Business, 2029-2025 ■ Under $2.5M ■ Over $2.5M 32% 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2023 2024 2025 40 30 20 10 0 (%) Online Sales As Percentage of Total Sales Volume, 2017-2025 ■ Under $2.5M ■ Over $2.5M 12% 34% 12% 34% 12% 22% 13% 33% 16% 23% 15% 30% 21% 30% 23% 40 • MARCH 2026 • PPAI Must Read | PPAI Sales Volume
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