Companies need to stop giving corporate swag that people just throw in the trash

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Todd Hirsch is a contributing columnist for The Globe and Mail. He is Calgary-based economist, author and public speaker. He is also the director of the Energy Transition Centre.

If you gave a child a birthday gift, and the next day they threw it in the garbage, you might ask some questions.

Yet companies do this all the time, and no one seems to be asking anything. In the corporate world, they are called promotional items, but for everyone on the receiving end, they’re more commonly referred to as “swag.” Cheap plastic trinkets, little cartoon key chains, crappy pens that don’t work, T-shirts that no one needs and fridge magnets that make the kitchen look messy.

All of these freebies are creating a strain on our landfills, with some of them ending up in rivers, lakes and oceans. The irony is that most of the companies doling out swag would claim to be committed to the environment. But the millions of pounds of garbage they’re handing out never gets mentioned in their ESG reporting.

It also costs a lot of money. Coresight Research, a retail and technology data insights firm, estimates employers globally spend $242-billion a year on corporate gifting. That includes gifts to their employees as well as to clients attending conferences or trade shows.

So what happens to all of this mostly plastic stuff?

It’s hard to say. Corporate swag isn’t exactly at the centre of scholarly research.

A commonly cited figure is that 40 per cent of all corporate gifts end up in landfills. That percentage is often attributed to a report from ING, but it appears to be derived from a 2016 ING report that wasn’t really about corporate swag, but rather about Christmas gifts that end up in the garbage.

But it’s not a stretch of anyone’s imagination that most – if not all – of the marketing swag we collect at conferences and trade shows ends up in the landfill. If that’s the destination for 40 per cent of Christmas gifts – presumably bought with intention and of higher value than corporate swag – then surely the figure for swag is higher. Almost all of it is cheap, useless and unnecessary.

Where does our collective desire for corporate swag come from? Most of us don’t need another travel mug, water bottle or squishy foam stress ball, but we still grab one from the promotional table at the trade show, or eagerly pull them out of the cheap canvas tote bag (also an environmental problem) when handed one at the conference registration.

Our momentary infatuation with swag stems from our consumer-driven society, in which getting something for free tricks us into thinking it has value. However, I’d argue that the “value” we put on free stuff is emotional, not intrinsic (that is, the perceived or calculated value). If you ask someone how much they think the corporate-branded mini-Frisbee is worth, most people would probably say nothing. Yet we take it anyway.

So what’s the solution?

The first is to raise awareness at the corporate level, and to ask those in charge of corporate swag to take a really hard look at the choices being made. Somebody in the company hierarchy (unlikely someone in the C-suite) has been given a budget for promotional items with corporate branding. Those people need to consider: Is this going to end up in a landfill? And if the answer is yes, then they should ask: What other choice can we make?

The second part of the solution is to offer creative alternatives to the cheap plastic and foam items, such as biodegradable or compostable items that have a more defined lifespan, and won’t end up clogging a landfill or ocean. Options here include items made of plant fibre, corn starch, recycled paper or polylactic acid (PLA). The obvious downside is that these items often cost more.

Or maybe it all goes digital. A QR code at the convention show booth gets the person a $5 coupon for a coffee. Maybe a link to an app, which is a game for kids to play. Or why not a gift code for a free movie on a streaming platform?

Third, perhaps it’s time to completely rethink the purpose of promotional swag. Is it to remind the consumer of your corporate brand and to reinforce a positive image of the company? Or is it something else? Is your intent really to give a gift to that aimless passerby at the trade show? Maybe you’re doing it out of habit, or because of a belief that “people like swag!”

It all comes down to something that should be simple and plain: Let’s think about what we’re doing. We’d all be better served if corporate swag could be reduced, or at least designed to minimize its impact on the environment. It would also help the bottom line.