Appreciated your observations on the tradeshow giveaways. Even as a distributor and consultant on promotional products who would like clients to buy more SWAG (of course!), I would rather have them not buy junk that doesn’t align with their marketing objectives. So I always suggest selecting promotional products with care.

As to greener giveaways, I would suggest that tradeshow exhibitors strongly consider degradable/biodegradable giveaways if they are looking at plastic products. That way if they are thrown in the trash, they will degrade in a short period of time (sometimes 1 to 10 years, as opposed to millenia for many standard petroleum-based plastics).

Another option is recyclable products. Make sure you indicate somewhere on the product that it is recyclable (with the arrow triangle symbol and class, i.e. 5) if it is not already identified. Last week I did a reusable and recyclable tradeshow bag order for a client where we imprinted 100% recyclable (which it is) right on the front of the bag.

So to help keep tradeshow giveaways away from the landfills, I would suggest either going with degradable or recyclable promotional products.

Always enjoy your Twitterings!