Clouds In My Coffee

When writing this column, it’s not often that I have a wealth of material with which to work.  I was more than halfway done with my most recent piece…admittedly one on which I was struggling finding focus (yes…I really do try)…when something else crossed my radar that made me start anew.  The bonus for you, Gentle Reader, is that I’m already at work on my next column.  The downside is that I’m already at work on my next column.

I was wasting time on perusing Twitter when I came upon a post which resonated with me.  Unlike most of the posts I like on Twitter…many of which seem to emphasize people’s desire to prove Darwinism right…this one kinda sorta involved promotional advertising, so I went off in that direction instead.  While I fully recognize that this might not be the ultimate destination for this column, my outlook is hopeful. 

Should you (A) not be on Twitter, and/or (2) have the attention span of a toddler on a diet of lollipops and soda, I’ll summarize for you.  The OP (that’s “Original Poster” for you luddites) extoled his dislike for coffee mugs, writing “Stop giving people coffee mugs.  Nobody needs a coffee mug.  There are too many coffee mugs as it is”.  As amusing as I found that, another person commented, “The road to hell is paved with promotional coffee mugs”.

Yes, I smiled.  Yes, I laughed.  Yes, I shared a screenshot on Facebook which fell on deaf ears (or “blind eyes” I guess is more accurate).  Too close to home, maybe?

Since the promo universe did not collectively fall on the floor at that “road to hell” comment, I went back onto Twitter to see what the general population had to say.

At the risk of generalizing, it appears to me that teachers hate coffee mugs.  “Hate” might be too strong a word.  “Loathe”?  “Detest”?  Regardless, it appears that teachers are sick of receiving coffee mugs as teacher gifts at the end of the school year.  As one First Grade teacher wrote, “I can only make so many pencil holders with all of my mugs”.

Do the math (as has been previously documented, math is not my strong suit, but work with me on this, okay?): if a teacher has twenty students in a class (I genuinely have no idea what the average class size is…I went to school in New York City, where it was not uncommon to have over thirty students in one class…most of whom were named Michael, Barbara, or Susan but that’s besides the point), and each student gave the teacher a mug and this teacher worked for twenty-five years, they would have amassed a collection of over 500 mugs.  That’s more than enough to supply a restaurant.

Another teacher suggested leaving the excess in the teacher’s lounge…and doing so on the down-low before you were caught.  I’m not going to do math again as my head still hurts from that last paragraph, but if every teacher dropped off all of their mugs…well…you’re gonna need a warehouse soon.

Back to the restaurant concept…someone made what I thought was a great suggestion: this commenter mentioned a local diner that served beverages in used (and let’s assume washed) mugs.  I think that would make for a very fun collection.  Further to this, another coffee shop marks and stores similar mugs by size, which can then relate to the cost of the consumer’s beverage.

The thread did take a good, professional turn early on (which couldn’t be maintained as readers were having too much fun): one person posted that she is a promotional products distributor in Chicagoland (I have no idea who she is, as she uses an alias as do many Twerps) and she prefers to sell “a nice tumbler”.  She also doesn’t like selling cheap pens.  Another commenter asked her what she recommends and she wrote that she begs her customers to buy better quality products.  Maybe I’m kidding myself but I’m hoping this turns into a lead for her.

Someone else commented that they work in a thrift store and there were so many mugs…promotional and otherwise…available.  Maybe there are too many?

I’ve mentioned this before: I am an awful ambassador for the promotional products industry, as I still wear shirts given to me over twenty years ago.  That they still fit is worthy of another column, perhaps.  The last thing I need is another t-shirt Or coffee mug.  Our cabinet here at home contains less than a dozen mugs (there are more…somewhere…should the Trophy Wife and I ever entertain again), most of which we’ve had for a very long time.  At least three were given to us by our son when he was in grammar school (for the uninitiated out there, he’s a married father of two).  He and his wife gave us two more when their first child was born, with our grandparent names on them: “Yaya” for my wife, and “Mr. Schenker” on mine.  No, I’m not kidding.  There’s one Mets mug in there, and one I bought for myself in Germany several years ago because I felt obligated to buy myself a souvenir.  The rest have decorations of some sort that have mostly worn away.

I’ve said this before: give your customers something that they need.  And want.  And will use.  Yes, I can go off on my semi-regular rant about fidget spinners, but I live in constant fear that one day someone who’s been stockpiling them will dump them in my driveway.

Could be worse.  Could be more coffee mugs.

If so, bring coffee.