Gift Focus - Sep/Oct 2018 (Issue 109)

of babies among our staff members, which has given us plenty of inspiration to further develop our range of personalised baby gifts! What values are important to the company? One of our core values is that we listen to our customers and take product and service feedback on board to ensure that we are providing exactly what they need. It’s vital that we are able to offer a product range that works for all customers regardless of the size of their business or their target market. We also exhibit at trade shows, not only to showcase our products but also to gather feedback and hear from our customers about their successes and assess directions that we should move towards. Customer feedback has helped us to shape our product range and develop our service to better suit our customers’ needs. We try to visit most trade shows in the UK, as this gives us an excellent opportunity to explore the latest trends and also to network with suppliers from across the industry. How does PMC stand out from the competition? We are proud of our simple and efficient drop- shipping service, which gives us the ability to improve our lead times at high seasonal demand, with Christmas being the most important time. Through years of innovation and investment into our systems, we are able to ensure all of our promised lead times are achieved. In fact, over the Christmas period, we can handle up to 20,000 personalised items in a day. Another way in which we stand out is with our diverse product range. We’ve established ourselves as a one-stop-shop for personalised gifts, and to do this we supply a gift for every recipient and occasion. We’re always looking for ways to grow our product range, and our new product team is constantly looking toward the next big trends. What have been some of the highlights for the business so far? We are now approaching our 15 th year, which is a huge milestone in itself. However, one of the biggest highlights has been watching the business grow from a small team of staff to more than 70 core employees and a huge 22,000sq ft site. Another highlight is the growth of our licensed gift portfolio, which has seen big names like Me to You, Boofle, Paddington and Purple Ronnie come on board with us, allowing us to add a personalised touch to these classic characters. Our personalised map products are another important licence for us, especially as we’ve recently added a variety of brand-new and on-trend designs to the range. Are you active on social media? How important is this for PMC? We are active on social media, particularly on Facebook and Twitter. We use these platforms to help keep our customers up-to-date with our latest products, and we find that social media complements the use of email newsletters well. These platforms are also a great way to hear directly from our trade customers, so our customer service team regularly monitors our social media accounts and assists with any queries. How are you finding the current economic climate? These are challenging times with economic uncertainty, and we are all aware most costs have increased and continue to do so. However, as we operate within an extremely price-sensitive market, we strive to offer the best value. As such, we always try to hold price increases where possible because we believe it’s essential to remaining competitive for our customers. What can we expect in the future from PMC? We are about to launch our brand-new trade website, which will transform our online presence. Our new site is a major departure from the old one, as we’ve made it much easier for customers to browse the range and find exactly what they’re looking for. We’ve also introduced a new way for shop-based customers to sell our products by enabling a “shop view” on our trade website. This gives customers the flexibility to show categories that are applicable to them and to decide their own RRPs without having to invest in their own website or in-store app. We’re always looking for new ideas and technology to allow us to personalise products in new and unique ways. This ensures our range is always at the cutting- edge of the personalised gift market and continues to meet customers’ diverse needs. A great example of something “outside the box” is our personalised unicorn LED night light, which is already proving to be a hit with retailers! We’re now looking towards Christmas, which is gearing up to be the biggest ever for us. Spring Fair is also on the horizon in February, which is certain to be our most exciting show yet. For further information, visit personalisedmemento.co.uk or call +44 (0)1782 744 900 keep it personal 38 giftfocus