Many people find it hard to think about the year-end holidays when they are months away, but when it comes to corporate gift-giving, it’s definitely worth a few minutes of your time.

Why? Because in order to get holiday gifts into the hands of customers and prospects, you need to start planning now to ensure they arrive when you want them to. Last year, one manufacturer we know of processed more than 100,000 calendar orders that involved over one million pieces, and the last-minute production crunch nearly resulted in a meltdown when an unforeseen glitch in the system slowed things to a crawl.

And that’s just one company. Multiply that number times hundreds of manufacturers and millions of products, and the potential for backups and delays increases exponentially.

That’s why it makes good sense to get ahead of the curve and start things rolling now. Sure, it’s early. But don’t forget that the process of brainstorming, selecting products, coming up with the appropriate message/imprint, creating a design, getting it OK’d and signing off on proofs can take weeks – and all that has to happen before your order can be processed and scheduled.

So we encourage you not to wait. Give us a call and set the wheels in motion. We’ll be happy to help you design a holiday gift program that will resonate with recipients. Maybe a Thanksgiving delivery date will really make you stand out from the crowd, or maybe a multi-part mailing of three or four smaller gifts spread out over a few weeks is a more effective way to manage your budget.

Whatever you decide, getting started now lets you breathe a little easier come holiday time, when all of your competitors will be scrambling to get their gifts out. Remember: It’s only a few months from now, and we all know how time has a habit of slipping away!

If you’re ready to start talking about the ’06 holiday season, call me at 212-868-1813 or send me an e-mail.