Finding the perfect present for someone can be a tough task. Beverage companies offer promotional packages to solve some of the gift-giving woes and worries. From tea to soda to spirits and liqueurs, promotional packaging covers all the categories. These are only a taste of the promotional packages available this year.

Crème liqueur and mugs

Café Bohême, a product of Kobrand Corp., Purchase, N.Y., offers the Café Bohême Gift Set, which includes a bottle of Café Bohême, a coffee crème liqueur and two Parisian café-inspired coffee mugs. Café Bohême can be enjoyed on the rocks, in a specialty crème cocktail or as an alternative to dessert, the company says. In addition to the gift set, Café Bohême is available year round in 1-liter, 750-ml., 375-ml. and 50-ml. bottles. The gift set retails for $22.

 

Holiday tea gifts

The Republic of Tea, Novato, Calif., introduced its 2008 Holiday Collection of teas, herbs and gifts. The company’s Hot Apple Cider Tea is packaged in 2.03-ounce canister of 36 tea bags that features an apple design on the front label. The Comfort and Joy Tea is Republic of Tea’s holiday spice blend. It is made with black tea leaves blended with fruit, blossoms and spices. Comfort and Joy Tea is available in a 2.8-ounce canister of 50 tea bags and a Traveler’s Tin containing six tea bags. The package features a red snow flake design on the label. The company also offers Tea of Good Tidings, which is the full-leaf winter fruit blend. The newest promotional package is Republic of Tea’s Tea Travel Kit for Beauty, Tea Travel Kit for Rest and Tea Travel Kit for Relieving Stress. The kits combine the company’s Be Well Red Teas in traveler’s tins.

 

Tea sets

Numi Organic Tea introduced a variety of gift options for the 2008 holiday season. All of the loose teas are organic and from India, Japan, China and South Africa. The set includes a flower motif black ceramic teapot, strainer and matching cups. Numi also offers a Bamboo Flowering Tea Gift Set that includes a hand-made dark bamboo case holding Numi’s Bouquet Flowering Tea and Numi’s Teahouse glass teapot. The glass teapot can be used to watch the tea petals bloom, the company says. The IRelax box set includes an organic and Fair Trade certified assortment of Numi’s teas as well as a collection of 11 tracks on a CD that aim to soothe the mind, the company says. Lastly, Numi offers an Organic & Fair Trade Bamboo Book, which is filled with six Numi teas.

 

Cocktail mixers

Stirrings, Fall River, Mass., offers an assortment of holiday gift sets, including Small but Mighty, Cocktail Connoisseur, Cocktail Caddy and Classic Gift Sets. Small but Mighty contains three 4-ounce Stirrings Cocktail Mixers in Cosmopolitan, Mojito and Pomegranate flavors. Cocktail Connoisseur is eight 4-ounce Stirrings Cocktail Mixers, including Apple, Margarita, Mojito, Wild Blueberry, Pear, Peach Bellini, Cosmopolitan and Pomegranate. Cocktail Caddy includes four 8-ounce Stirrings Cocktail Mixers: Pomegranate, Cosmopolitan, Margarita and Mojito. The Classic Gift Sets combine a 32-ounce Stirrings Cocktail Mixer with a 3.5-ounce Rimmer in a gift box.

 

Rhum and syrup gift pack

Depaz Blue Cane Rhum Agricole and its signature Cane Syrup are available together in the Depaz Dual Pack. Depaz is a Martinique blue cane rhum agricole made from estate-grown blue cane and the Depaz Cane Syrup, also made from Martinique, contains cane sugar and filtered water. The Depaz Dual Pack includes a 750-ml. bottle of Depaz Blue Cane Amber Rhum and a 750-ml. bottle of Depaz Cane Syrup. The gift pack retails for $42.

 

Seasonal Beers

The team at Object 9, Baton Rouge, La., created new packaging for Wild Goose Brewery’s family of beer products. Wild Goose’s Snow Goose Winter Ale and Pumpkin Patch Ale, both seasonal brews, received contemporary packaging, the company says. The Pumpkin Patch Ale features a pumpkin on the six-pack, and the Snow Goose Winter Ale has a frost effect, the company says. Each flavor is available in six-packs with 12-ounce bottles.

 

Trio-pack cognac

Delamain Cognac, Jarnac, France, introduced the Delamain Trio Pack for the 2008 holiday season. The trio pack consists of Delamain Grande Champagne Cognacs, including Pale & Dry XO, Vesper and Trés Venerable, all in 200-ml. bottles. All of the cognacs have been aged for a certain length, with Trés Venerable the oldest and Pale & Dry XO the youngest. The Trio Pack retails for $129.

 

Pernod Ricard gift packs

Pernod Ricard USA, Purchase, N.Y., announced value-added packaging for its lineup of spirits and wine brands. A 750-ml. bottle of Beefeater London Dry Gin is packaged with two Beefeater-etched glasses, and a 1.75-liter of Beefeater is packaged with a branded cocktail shaker. Chivas Regal has three packages: Chivas 12 Year Old 750-ml. bottle packaged with two Chivas rocks glasses, a Chivas 12 Year Old 1.75-liter bottle with a branded glass decanter, and a Chivas 18 Year Old packaged with a branded ice bucket available in a wood box. A 750-ml. bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey is offered with two Jameson rocks glasses. Kahlua Coffee Liqueur is available in two gift packs: a bottle of Kahlua Coffee Liqueur with a branded glass coffee mug or a bottle of Kahlua Coffee Liqueur, the coffee mug and three 50-ml. bottles of Kahlua French Vanilla, Hazelnut and Mocha. Martell Cognac is being offered with two branded Martell Cognac snifters. A 750-ml. bottle of The Glenlevit 12 Year Old is in a gift-pack with two branded rocks glasses. Wild Turkey Bourbon has two holiday gift packs: a 750-ml. bottle of Wild Turkey 101 with two rocks glasses and Wild Turkey Rare Breed in a latched wood box with two branded Rare Breed rocks glasses. And Champagne Perrier Jouët is offered with a 750-ml. bottle of Perrier Jouët Fleur and two hand-painted champagne flutes.

 

Brandy gift box

Gran Duque de Alba Solera Gran Reserva, Jerez de la Frontera, Spain, is available in a gift box with a 750-ml. bottle of Gran Duque de Alba and glass snifter. The brandy is aged 12 years in oak casks under Spain’s solera system of fractional blending. The bottle features a photograph of the Duke of Flanders on the label and a wax seal designed by Antoni Cumella. The gift package retails for $49.99. BI

Walk into the supermarket, peruse the alcohol aisle, and you’re bound to notice a bottle with a promotional display on its side. For example, many alcohol beverages have small attachments on one of the walls of the bottle.

Stephen Crossman, owner of OnPack Solutions Inc., Montreal, Quebec, creates ways for companies to attach plastic handles, multi-pack carriers, on-pack attachments, and other packaging components to various beverages. “Most people put the emphasis on the giveaway for promotions and they don’t put a lot of thought into how to attach the giveaway to the host bottle or the host product,” Crossman says.

 

“The guys that are selling the widgets or promotional items very rarely get involved with the packaging of the item as to how it is going to be presented on the bottle,” Crossman says. “In other words, if you’re buying key chains to go on a bottle as a giveaway, you’ll buy your key chains from one guy and the key chains will arrive and then you’ll think, ‘Well, now what do we do.’ So we design a method that is the most efficient and economical [so] that you can attach the product.”

 

OnPack offers a variety of sizes and shapes to fit any bottle that comes its way. The company can custom-mold an attachment for any size bottle as well.

 

In addition, Crossman says he wants to eliminate the need for extra secondary packaging. Using the space in the box to position the bottles with the attachments in place saves money and it is more economical, he says.

 

“I try to create solutions so people can use their existing packing cartons,” he says. “If you attach an on-pack the wrong way, you end up having to buy new boxes.”

 

If the on-pack promotions are attached after they arrive in stores, there is a chance that that value-item will fall off either the package or the shelving, Crossman says. In that case, the item will most likely be shipped back to the supplier, he says.

 

Crossman says the current trend in attachments is the 50-ml. mini bottle. “Minis are still very popular as a giveaway,” he says. “When you go buy a larger bottle of liquor, what they’ll do is cross-promote with another brand. All of these products have to be fixed somehow to the product itself.” BI

The summer Olympics comes around every four years and while athletes are working hard to perfect their skills, so are beverage companies to promote the events. Michael Coleman, managing director of Anthem Worldwide, worked with the Coca-Cola Co. to develop the logo for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
 

“Coke engaged us for this program and what Coke tried to do is not approach the packaging around the Olympics in the old way,” Coleman says. “The old way is you put the Olympic rings on the package with a little flag that say ‘A Proud Sponsor of [the] Olympics. “Coke developed a much more integrated and holistic approach, which provides a cohesive and coherent message that both supports the Olympic movement and also supports Coke’s brand strategy.”

 

After some creative exploration, Anthem Worldwide developed a series of concepts for the Olympic logo on the packaging.

 

“Acknowledging that different regions would have different needs, we had a design that each region could choose to use based on how well it conformed to their market situation,” Coleman says.

 

Promotional packaging is becoming more integrated with brand strategy so that it is no longer seen as a short-term, attention-getting, purely sales driving technique, Coleman adds.

 

“The latter is now seen as a means that marketers can employ to achieve short-term revenue gathering objectives as well as long-term brand building objectives,” he says. “It’s no longer seen as a tactic; it’s being elevated to a more strategic level.” BI