News, Nuggets, and What’s Worth Knowing

🧂 A Dash of Industry Insights

🧠 New Take on Recognition: Tired of generic “Great job!” shoutouts? Harvard Business Review suggests a better way: reflective recognition. Instead of guessing what to praise, ask your team what they’re proud of and why. This simple shift sparks engagement, builds trust, and makes recognition more personal and meaningful.

🧑‍🎓 National Intern Day: National Intern Day is July 24, and it's the perfect excuse to recognize their hard work. A branded gift from your company store can make them feel like part of the culture from day one. Need help getting it launched? We’ve got you covered. Reply to this email with “INTERN” to explore options.

🎉 Giveaway Winner Alert: Shout-out to Jessica from Alas Creative on winning the Glacier Peak XL Cooler Bag! Missed out last week? No sweat, we have another fresh giveaway below!

♻️ PPAI Responsibility Summit: If sustainability, safety, or compliance are on your radar (and they should be), the PPAI Responsibility Summit is where the best minds in promo come together. Learn more + register here.

🤯 Fun Fact to Drop in a Meeting: The average office chair travels about 8 miles per year from people rolling around at their desks. So yes, technically you’re doing cardio while you work.

Behind the Scenes of Brand Sauce

🤠 Why Swag Feels Like the Wild West

Here’s the truth: every company wants great swag and a company store but almost no one knows how the ecosystem actually works.

There’s no playbook, no central resource, and definitely no “Chief Swag Officer” to make sense of it all. That responsibility usually falls on someone in HR, marketing, or ops who’s already wearing 12 hats… and suddenly they’re expected to figure out vendors, pricing, fulfillment, tech integrations, and more.

This week as we were finalizing a few RFPs it hit us again, how much mystery still surrounds this space. We see it every time: smart teams asking great questions, but missing key context simply because no one’s ever explained it.

That’s why, at Brand Sauce, we see education as part of the job.

We don’t just respond to RFPs…we guide, simplify, and clarify. Because choosing the right swag partner isn’t just about the products. It’s about culture, logistics, tech, and long-term impact.

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering how this industry really works, or what you should be asking, just reach out. Email [email protected] or reply here. We’ll keep pulling back the curtain, sharing what we know, and doing our part to bring transparency, creativity, and ease to this overlooked corner of your employee experience.

Lights, Camera, Action

🎥 Ross's Video of the Week

In this episode of My First Million, Sam Parr and Shaan Puri sit down with Shopify President Harley Finkelstein to unpack how “boring” products can become $100M businesses. From storytelling hacks to Swiss Army knife founders, Harley drops gems on brand-building, decision-making, and even Shopify’s internal take on AI. If you like no-fluff takes on how real empires get built, this one’s a must-watch.

👉 Watch the full episode

Weekly Vendor Spotlight

 🤝 Meet Rupt

Founded by industry trailblazers Jason Lucash and Mike Szymczak, RUPT is more than a brand; it’s a manifesto against ordinary swag. These two promo veterans saw an industry ready for reinvention and responded with boldness, creativity, and a fierce commitment to sustainability. Their mission? Redefine what branded products can look like, feel like, and stand for.

🎒 Their Products

RUPT’s line includes elevated essentials like premium backpacks, drinkware, and tech accessories—all designed with a modern aesthetic and an emphasis on quality. But this isn’t your standard promo catalog. Every item tells a story—built from recycled materials, engineered for longevity, and packaged like a retail-ready unboxing experience. From the product to the packaging, every detail is intentional.

🌍 Sustainability

RUPT is leading the charge toward a cleaner future.

• Every product is made with 100% recycled materials like rABS, rStainless Steel, rPolyester, and more.

• Each item is certified carbon neutral, with full emissions transparency.

• Packaging is FSC-certified and designed for second-life use.

They don’t just talk sustainability, they build it into every layer of their business.

🤝 Partner with RUPT

Feel free to email us at [email protected] to add RUPT products to your company store.

P.S. Don’t take our word for it, check out what Jon Gruden had to say about RUPT.

barstoolgruden

474K followers

View more on Instagram

Weekly Giveaway

🎁 Giveaway Alert: Custom LED Sign

This week, we're giving away something that literally lights up your brand.

Introducing Neolyt by Rupt, a fully custom LED display that transforms your logo, wordmark, or wildest brand idea into a glowing sculpture. These aren’t cookie-cutter neon signs. Each one is built from your design file and brought to life with precision LED tech, clean edge-to-edge glow, and jaw-dropping packaging.

Use it to turn your office wall into a vibe. Drop it into your next welcome kit. Or just flex it in your home workspace during Rumi calls.

MSRP: $300

👉 To enter, reply to this email with one word, phrase, or symbol you’d turn into a glowing sign. The winner will be announced in next week’s newsletter.

Weekend Update

Around the Water Cooler With Ross AKA The P.O.D. Guy

If you’re married or in a long-term relationship, maybe you’ve felt this too.

You hear stories. Over the years, you hear dozens, maybe hundreds of them, tales of childhood bedrooms and backyards, of grandparents just up the hill, of first pets, silly mishaps, and simple joys. You try to imagine it all. You build a picture in your mind of what your partner’s world looked like before you ever existed in it.

Madison has shared so many of those stories with me. And not just her, her family too. Stories of the house she grew up in, the ranch they lived on, the lake, the bike rides, the sleepovers at her grandparents’ place, just a short way up the hill.

I’ve heard them all. I’ve loved them all.

Whenever we meet new friends from my life, the question always comes up to Madison: "Where are you from? Did you grow up in San Diego?"

And I get to watch her face light up as she says, “No, I grew up an hour north of San Diego, in a town called Murrieta. We had a 40-acre ranch, and my grandparents lived on it with us.”

Fourteen years ago, her family sold the ranch and moved to San Diego. The land has since been transformed into a charming wedding venue and animal sanctuary, with alpacas, donkeys, chickens, ducks, cows, and horses. But to me, it’s more than that.

Because recently, I got to drive through the front gates of Madison’s childhood home.

I saw the room where she slept from the time she was a little girl until the day she left for college. I saw the land where she rode her bike. I saw the lake she fished in with nothing but a ruler and a hook. I saw the hill she climbed to sleep at her grandparents’ house, and the open space where she played catch with her dad, a thousand softballs ago.

And for the first time, I didn’t have to imagine anymore. I could see it. Feel it. I could step inside the world that shaped her, the world she’s been telling me about for so many years.

It moved me in ways I didn’t expect. Because childhood isn't just a place in time. It's where the story begins, and where the heart still quietly returns.

I hope this brings back a happy memory or two for you. 

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