Last week we discussed how buying the right promotional products can separate your company from the competition, produce the greatest ROI for your promotion, and lead to sales generation over an extended period of time. We learned that a custom branded USB drive will produce the best results because of the ability to brand the inside and outside, provide a product that will be widely used in many locations and in front of many potential clients, and last for 10 years of excellent brand display.
Today we are going to look at how to buy these products at the best price to fit your needs.
A Quick Review of How USB Drive Pricing Works
Promotional USB drives are made up of 5 key components:
- The PCB (printed circuit board)
- The USB controller (the thing that sends/receives data)
- The flash chip (what stores your data)
- The outer casing (including the cap, swivels, keyring loops, shell, highlights, basically everything you see and touch)
- The printing on the case
Each of these components have a price attached to them. The PCB and the controller are both standard components that don't fluctuate very much. These two components account for about 10% of the cost of the drive.
The flash chip does fluctuate however. Flash chips are traded (like gold and silver) on an open market and the price of these chips are dictated by supply and demand. As a fab (the industry name for the factory that makes semiconductor products) builds more chips, the price goes down. But when they have built more chips than the market demands, they switch their focus to a different product, say DRAM. The supply of flash goes down and the price is driven up. This is why the cost of flash drives is in constant flux and why most companies require providing a quote instead of providing pricing on their website. (Bizdrive has a pretty sophisticated pricing structure on our website that allows us to provide accurate pricing at all times. I'd tell you how but it's really boring...). The flash chip accounts for about 40-80% of the cost of the flash drive, depending on what density the chip is (higher density=higher price).
The case is another piece that does not fluctuate in price, EXCEPT for when large volumes are ordered. The case is broken down into two parts: materials and assembly. The materials have a fixed cost attached to them and don't change, however as more volume is ordered (1000+ units) the cost of labor goes down, so the price of the drive goes down. The casing runs about 30-60% of the cost of the drive.
The last piece is the printing. This piece costs the least of all. The cost of printing on a USB device is very small, only about 1-3% of the cost of the drive. However, no matter how many times a logo has been printed in the past, the company must charge a setup fee (usually $50-$100) in order to cover labor costs of changing the print device to a new logo. This fee is sometimes waived if a large enough order has been made (Bizdrive waives the $50 setup fee at orders of 1000 units or more).
How USB Drive Pricing Effects You
When you are shopping for your custom branded USB drives, here's how to get the best price.
Order in volume. The more units you order the better your cost per unit is. If you know that you are going to need 1200 units per year, buy them all at once instead of 100 units each month. The price difference between 100 units ordered 12 times against 1200 units ordered once is significant (usually around $1,000!). Plus you'll pay less for freight AND get your setup fee waived.
Be a wholesaler. If you are buying custom USB drives to resell, tell your provider! We love having customers who are continually buying drives in order to sell them to their customers. USB suppliers will usually give significant price breaks to other wholesalers. Tell your provider what your intentions are in order to get the best prices.
Buy densities that fit your project. If you are buying USB drives to give out at tradeshows, 1GB-2GB will usually fit your purposes. Don't pay the extra money for 4GB and up. However, if you are considering reselling the USB drives, higher densities are advisable. Know your targets and what they want and purchase accordingly.
Shop around. Don't just click on the first couple sites on Google that you find. Usually smaller USB companies will give you better pricing than the big boys. The big boys have more staff to pay for including a high sales commission and other SGA costs that smaller providers don't. The other great (best) thing about smaller providers is that they want to earn and keep your business and will do more to make you happy than the big boys. Don't be afraid of going to page 2 on a search for a great USB provider.
Next, we'll look at the difference in quality of USB drive providers and provide some pointers to avoid getting inferior product while staying within your budget.
Justin Throngard
Vice President
Bizdrive - Custom USB Drives
(208)440-1999
jthrongard@bizdriveusb.com
http://www.bizdriveusb.com
When you are looking for a strong, professional, and reliable supplier of custom branded promotional USB drives, Bizdrive is where you need to go. Justin Throngard is Vice President of Bizdrive and wants to earn your business. Learn how Bizdrive will guarantee your satisfaction
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Justin_Throngard
