Round Up: The Best Culture & Community Swag We’ve Seen
In this article
Great swag isn’t only about quality. Surprised? That’s because no matter how good your swag is, it won’t matter if it doesn’t reach the right people!
And one of the best ways to leverage swag to its fullest potential is all about upgrading your organization’s culture with awesome swag.
Whether you’re just starting to build the foundation of your company culture, or looking for ways to support your already thriving community, choosing high quality swag can help you take it to the moon.
SKIP AHEAD 🚀
Company Culture
Community Swag
What Is Culture and Community Swag?
You can approach swag from a pure promotional perspective (think cheap, mass produced, single-use items) or you can think about how your swag is influencing the big picture. And here’s a new truth: swag isn’t a one-off! Even if you are using swag for a specific situation or use-case.
Maybe you need swag for an event or a special group gift. But because of its physical nature, your swag has become a remarkable piece of your brand with the power to grow your community and share your organization’s culture with people anywhere, anytime – independently of your team’s direct attention and efforts!
In other words, swag helps you scale marketing. It’d be a huge missed opportunity not to leverage it for growing culture and community. And with 2020 being a year where many teams entered the remote and distributed workspace for the first time, we’re excited to share and celebrate some of the most inspiring and best culture & community swag of this year.
Swag in the Wild 2020 Edition
If you follow our Swag in the Wild newsletter, you know that we regularly feature great swag ideas and projects from our clients in our newsletter and blog.
With the year now coming to a close, our team went back to review the highlights of the year. This list is the 2020 Swag in the Wild Round Up – so get ready for a showcase of the best and brightest teams with swag worth sharing!
Company Culture
General Team Swag
For when you want the freedom to be flexible. These swag projects master the art of versatility while promoting team swag that supports great company culture! Ideal for both one-off swag and general branding purposes.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Crunchbase Team/Family Shirts
COMPANY: Crunchbase
PURPOSE: Crunchbase has built a great culture, even while remote. Awesome t-shirts for an awesome team!
WHERE IT SHINES: Treat your team like family, and you’re on your way to a company culture that is larger than life. We love that everyone is able to join in on this fun swag moment.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
ONE Sotheby’s International Realty Nike Tech Polos
COMPANY: ONE Sotheby’s International Realty
PURPOSE: The ONE SIR team sports an incredibly classy & cool look at #FLIBS
WHERE IT SHINES: For swag your employees will actually wear, consider how your swag plays into their wardrobe throughout the year. Go with high quality swag and watch the ROI skyrocket for your brand strength and culture.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
BHHS Team Swag
COMPANY: Berkshire Hathaway Home Services Chicago (BHHS)
PURPOSE: BHHS gets branding right with a wicked swag store for all their employees and clients!
WHERE IT SHINES: Swag so good everyone wants one… even people who have no idea what your company does. Now that’s a swag win.
Having stuff that’s good quality is important to us, and it was important to one of our executives that started the department with us. They were like, I don’t want to sell crappy anything just to slap our logo onto it. That’s how we found you guys.
CORINNA CARAHER, DIRECTOR OF PEOPLE & CULTURE AT BHHS
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Official Women’s Sport Foundation Store Merch
COMPANY: Women’s Sport Foundation
PURPOSE: A selection of quality official WSF swag for the organization’s top supporters & advocates!
WHERE IT SHINES: Gear for female athletes to score on and off the field! We love that the WSF team thought of using swag to bring in proceeds impacting over 100,000 girls and women across the nation.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Cybrary Team Hoodies
COMPANY: Cybrary
PURPOSE: The Cybrary team gets creative with swag for a variety of use cases, from virtual giveaways to creator appreciation!
WHERE IT SHINES: The Cybrary team has pulled off several swag projects with seriously high quality swag worth of their community leaders, creator contributors, and ambitious top-performing students! It doesn’t just provide for a level of community spirit beyond the screen, but also strengthens Cybrary’s brand and helps them reach new audiences with minimal effort.
See More:
- Empire Selling Rebrand Swag
- Facebook Community Leadership Program
- Beam Suntory Employee Swag
- Hyannis Sound Official Merch
- Sana Benefits Team Swag
- Shiseido Community Volunteer Shirts
Company Culture
New Hires and Onboarding
For laying the groundwork of great company culture. A must-have culture element in the modern workspace, new hire and onboarding swag packs are one of the easiest ways to support a thriving company culture.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Nasdaq New Hire Welcome Packs
COMPANY: Nasdaq
PURPOSE: Start off their newest talent with a warm welcome from day 1, no matter where they are in the world
WHERE IT SHINES: Nasdaq is a company with bragging rights to the SwagUp Hall of Fame. And it’s well earned too — the Nasdaq team isn’t just good at appreciating their employees and growing a thriving company culture everywhere in the world; they also manage to do it consistently. (Search up #NasdaqFam on LinkedIn to see for yourself!)
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
UDel Staff Swag Packs
ORGANIZATION: University of Delaware (UDel)
PURPOSE: Welcome university staff to the UDel family, both on campus and at home!
WHERE IT SHINES: University swag can be a challenge – after all, there are freebies almost everywhere. We love that the UDel team skipped the pain of digging through a closet of swag trying to make sure they had enough of everything, and instantly leveled up with high quality swag picks their team will love.
At a university, there’s always some event going on in which you receive something just for going. So it was kind of, how do we make our onboarding and our employee engagement piece stand out?
CRISTEN SMITH, ENGAGEMENT SPECIALIST AT UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Curion Employee Swag Packs
COMPANY: Curion
PURPOSE: New swag for new teammates 🎉
WHERE IT SHINES: The Curion team hires with culture in mind and it shows with the welcome they give their newest employees! We love these nice Allbirds to appreciate their hard working talent. Which just goes to show: great culture is something you build every day.
When new hires get their swag pack, they feel like they’re part of the team, they have a shirt, they have a mug, they have their notebook, so it gives them that head start to really dive into their new role and feel they’re supported going into it. It gives them a warm welcome.
NATALIE DIMASI, HUMAN RESOURCES COORDINATOR AT SOFTHEON
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Softheon Onboarding Swag Pack
COMPANY: Softheon
PURPOSE: Perfectly timed remote onboarding swag so their new talent can hit the ground running!
WHERE IT SHINES: Scaling swag can be a huge pain in the butt when you are working remote (and everyone else is too). That’s where DIY swag falls short. And because packing 100s of swag boxes and lugging them to the post office is not worth the lost workday hours, Softheon skipped out on that hassle via the SwagUp Platform. Of course, onboarding is just the start. Softheon supports their impressive culture with ongoing swag projects throughout the year!
See More:
- Sana New Hire Packs
- Vic.ai Employee Swag Packs
- Emergent Dynamic Welcome Kits
- TaxJar Welcome Swag Packs
- Amazon Intern Packs
- Localised New Hire Packs
- Bread Employee Swag
- Benchling New Hire Swag Packs
- Hopin Welcome to the Team Swag Pack
Company Culture
Employee Appreciation and Culture Moments
For the teams that never stop growing. Don’t just count employee anniversaries as a measure of your culture; consider too the growth they’ve made during their time there! Swag that appreciates your team helps them weather the toughest challenges and can even inspire them to rise to the moment.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Clari Employee Appreciation Swag Packs
COMPANY: Clari
PURPOSE: When Covid first hit, the Clari team pivoted to repurpose parts of their office budget originally spent on food to help teams working at home feeling engaged and appreciated.
WHERE IT SHINES: We love that this proactive thinking team took the initiative to appreciate their employees in a time of crisis, which helped reinforce the positive culture of the company!
Our company-wide slack channels flooded with thank you’s, and people were posting pictures of their kids […] it made my day, it made my week. It warmed my heart to see, reinforced the positive culture, and reinforced that we are always thinking about employees and how to adapt given different circumstances.
KYRENE WANG, PEOPLE OPERATIONS SPECIALIST AT CLARI
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Duolingo Remote Team Care Packages
COMPANY: Duolingo
PURPOSE: Duolingo takes a culture-first approach and gets creative with remote team bonding!
WHERE IT SHINES: Themed care packages are one way to score a huge culture win. This is a great case study into how you can use swag to support your remote team. Check it out on the Duolingo blog – you won’t want to miss this one.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Teampay “Year End Close” Packs
COMPANY: Teampay
PURPOSE: Teampay put together these awesome swag packs to show love to their customers and closeout the year on a high note!
WHERE IT SHINES: Although it’s tempting to rush onto the excitement and fun of tomorrow, it can be worth pausing to properly close out one chapter before beginning the next. We love that Teampay took the time to personally thank their beloved customers for being part of the journey.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
PRMG One Billion Dollar Club Milestone Swag
COMPANY: PRMG
PURPOSE: A box of milestone swag to appreciate the impressive MVPs at PRMG
WHERE IT SHINES: This is swag worthy of becoming a memento. We love milestone swag because it’s something that not only won’t be thrown away with the passing of time but will also be kept with pride over an achievement to talk about!
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Born with Notion Baby Packs
COMPANY: Notion
PURPOSE: Notion sends employees celebrating the expansion of their families some custom newborn swag!
WHERE IT SHINES: Swag to celebrate the major life moments. We love that the Notion team is right there with the congratulations for their hardworking employees.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Fivetran Pride Swag
COMPANY: Fivetran
PURPOSE: Pride Month Swag! 🌈
WHERE IT SHINES: If you want to create swag that your employees will wear, show off, and share with their friends and family, pay homage to the brand values that the company stands behind. Because oftentimes those are the same values that drew your talent and members of the community to the company in the first place.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Cision President’s Club Award Swag
COMPANY: Cision
PURPOSE: Cision leverages awesome award swag to support their top performer culture!
WHERE IT SHINES: We love that this swag pack is all about encouraging their talent to never stop growing, learning, and aiming to be #betterthanyesterday
See More:
- Intelligent Shift Employee Care Packages
- Panoramic Employee Swag Packs
- Crunchbase Team Holiday Jackets
- Galt Insurance SwagUp Baby Packs
Community Swag
Client Onboarding and Member Welcome
For when you need swag to seize the moment. These swag projects capture the power of tapping into the community around your brand. Whether you’re appreciating clients or welcoming new members, a quality swag pack is that perfect cherry on top.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
BurnRate Supporter Thank You Packs
COMPANY: BurnRate
PURPOSE: A box of swag appreciation for BurnRate’s biggest supporters!
WHERE IT SHINES: We love this swag pack specially designed for thanking clients who joined the BurnRate journey. Not only are the swag picks extraordinarily tasteful (and well designed!) but they also reinforces BurnRate’s culture in the best way possible during the onboarding process.
We just did our first trigger for shipments in the last 24 hours, so that was exciting. Having access to SwagUp API and being able to do what we need to with it, integrating it with our backend systems, it’s powerful.
ROBERT MCLAWS, CEO, AND CO-FOUNDER AT BURNRATE
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Snopes Founding Member Packs + Crowdfunding Success
COMPANY: Snopes
PURPOSE: Snopes used swag packs to activate their readers and raise over $1.5M in their “Founding Member” campaign.
WHERE IT SHINES: We love how the Snopes team used swag to add value to their contributing members while solving for their need of capital.
Snopes swiftly pivoted from a business based on 100% advertising revenue to a model almost 50/50 between reader direct revenue and programmatic advertising. Now that’s a swag win!
We’re redefining ourselves in a more sustainable way. We wanted to put together swag packs, but it was hard to figure out how to pull that off. We’re 100% remote so we don’t have a lot of bandwidth to do this ourselves. We needed something automated and effortless.
VINNY GREEN, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER AT SNOPES
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
AdOutreach Client Onboarding Packs
COMPANY: AdOutreach
PURPOSE: AdOutreach surprises clients with well-timed swag for a masterful onboarding process
WHERE IT SHINES: An amazing customer experience starts with a good first impression. The team at AdOutreach uses personalized message cards to the full extent, and we dig it.
These swag packs welcome new clients as they onboard — and it’s been fun for both the team and their clients! Moral of the story: get your strongest relationships off to a great start. Then follow up!
See More:
- Case Study: Jiminny Client Onboarding Swag Packs
- Case Study: Molis Coaching Member Welcome Swag
- MyVillage Educator Packs
- OnDeck New Fellow Welcome Swag Packs
- Policy Genius Sign-Up Sweepstakes
- Case Study: Smartbug Media
It humanizes the relationship. Especially being fully remote, we typically would never meet in person. When they receive that box of goodies, it reminds them we’re more than just a piece of paper, more than just a contract they signed.
JEN SPENCER, VP OF SALES AND MARKETING AT SMARTBUG MEDIA
Community Swag
Events and Celebrations
For the big and small moments where a physical complement helps you stand out. These swag projects are creative and inspiring ways to use swag in support of an event, and are great examples of when to use themed swag for maximum effect.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
EventGeek Virtual Event Attendee Swag
COMPANY: Circa (Formerly EventGeek)
PURPOSE: EventGeek hosted their Reboot 2020 event and used SwagUp redeem pages to collect addresses and send swag to get attendees excited about the event.
WHERE IT SHINES: Imagine swag showing up on your doorstep right after you attend a virtual event. Pretty cool right? That’s how EventGeek took their virtual event game to the next level using SwagUp. With custom redeem pages and dropshipping, you can easily add that perfect human touch to any virtual event.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
RNL Conference Swag Packs
COMPANY: Ruffalo Noel Levitz (RNL)
PURPOSE: The RNL team gets exciting Chicago-themed swag packs for attendees at their 34th annual national conference
WHERE IT SHINES: Originally planned in Chicago, the 2020 RNL National Conference was just one of many events impacted by the spread of COVID. However, the RNL team moved fast to counter the unexpected. Their virtual conference fully embraced the Chicago theme and even included offerings like virtual tours of historic landmarks and virtual yoga at Millenium Park. And with over 1,400 attendees participating in the virtual event, we’d say that’s a smashing success 🎉
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
HPLT Retreat Swag Packs
COMPANY: HPLT / Brian Mazza
PURPOSE: These swag packs are full of awesome, high quality gear exclusively for HPLT retreat members, delivered as a part of their retreat experience!
WHERE IT SHINES: Swag worthy of powering a movement. We love that Brian and the HPL team have put together swag packs that embody the mission and help their community members feel joy and pride in being part of something bigger.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Emory Nursing School Graduation Packs
ORGANIZATION: Emory Nursing School
PURPOSE: In a SwagUp first, we helped Emory get key graduation items and other swag to new grads for their remote ceremony
WHERE IT SHINES: Another group that got creative with how they approach virtual events and celebrations during 2020 is colleges and universities. Some moments only come once in a lifetime, and we’re proud to have helped Emory graduates celebrate their accomplishments. Whether you’re congratulating an impressive cohort or bringing people together for a virtual event, don’t miss the chance to leave an impression they’ll remember years from now.
See More:
Community Swag
Brand Awareness and Community Engagement
For when you want swag that supports a message and boosts community engagement…but without the hassle of 24/7 promotion. These swag projects all about leveraging maximum exposure and opportunity with minimal effort.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Quorum Community Ambassador Kits
COMPANY: Quorum
PURPOSE: Custom branded swag for supporting the growing Quorum community
WHERE IT SHINES: There are some swag picks that are practically considered essentials when it comes to using swag for community growth — like the picks the Quorum team made for their Community Ambassador Kits. That’s a swag expert tip for you: it’s really rather hard to go wrong with a pack of quality stickers, custom knit socks, and a comfortable t-shirt.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Outer Aisle Promotional Pizza Packs
COMPANY: Outer Aisle
PURPOSE: In collaboration with Growth Busters, SwagUp helps Outer Aisle celebrates the launch of their Cauliflower crust in style on National Pizza Day with clever pizza-themed swag packs
WHERE IT SHINES: Not enough companies take advantage of packaging as part of the message. Which is a pity, because as Outer Aisle proves, well-designed packaging just elevates the swag experience to a whole different level.
Of course, not every company should put swag in a pizza box (not that we’ll stop you, either) but there are more possibilities than you realize when it comes to designing the unboxing experience for your swag. From boxes with magnetic lids to swag you can smash to vintage-inspired wooden crates, the possibilities are pretty much endless.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
ShapeShift T-Shirt Giveaway
COMPANY: ShapeShift
PURPOSE: Incredibly Soft Giveaway T-Shirts for ShapeShift’s Booth at #ETHDenver!
WHERE IT SHINES: With such a kickass design on our soft Bella + Canvas tees, it’s no surprise everyone wanted one. Your swag will get easy traction with strangers and champions alike when you start with quality and share it with the people who already care about your brand. A cute mascot doesn’t hurt either.
🏆 SWAG PROJECT HIGHLIGHT
Jobber VIP Smash Box Swag
COMPANY: Jobber
PURPOSE: Exclusive Community Ambassador “Smash Box” Swag 🔨
WHERE IT SHINES: Ladies and gentlemen, this is one for the history books. One of the best parts of getting swag in the modern era is that it’s a thoughtful physical gesture that stands in stark contrast to the growing digitization of our world. Because sometimes it’s just fun to smash things.
We love the creativity from the Jobber team here; just 40 very lucky community ambassadors were sent VIP smash box for an Instagram-worthy moment.
See More:
- Fiverr Influencer Packs
- Cybrary Team Hoodies & Creator Swag Packs
- Official C.A. Goldberg Law Company Merch
- Microsoft for Startups Swag Packs
- Hyannis Sound Official Merch
- RapTV Shirts (ft. Aaron Gordon!)
- Modsi Agency Giveaway Swag
- Official Women’s Sport Foundation Store Merch
- BHHS Swag Store
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