Best and Worst Celebrity Gift Suites

Experience

When evaluating a team’s experience and gift suite management, look for a company that has done at least 20.  There are very few who can make that claim. An even smaller amount have managed thirty suites. Less at forty.  The team at Placement Directory is not only the sole team to have managed over 50, but we have managed over 100.  Experience matters! 

Structure

When a company tells you to bring some crazy number of items to a suite, maybe 150 or 199, it is just ridiculous. This usually means you will be passing items out to all sorts of managers, agents and friends instead of just to celebrities. We’ve seen 100’s of these high item requests with promises of “celebrities only,” but in the last 10 years we have not seen a single one of these events hold true to those promises. A professional gift suite should have about 40-55 celebrities.  Of course it is possible to bring 100’s of celebrities to a gift suite at once but it just hasn’t happened in the last decade and it is unlikely to happen anytime soon.   

We changed a critical element in the structure of gift suites and that has given us a HUGE competitive advantage over the other companies. We require a celebrity to take a picture in order to get a product.  The industry standard is to give a celebrity a product if they visit your booth. By definition a gift is something you give and get nothing in return. At Placement Directory we feel that companies are participating in gift suites to promote their brand and therefore do expect a photo to get a product. Because of this requirement, we get brands to give away better products and celebrities are happy to take pictures with good products!  

Results

We have generated over 150,000 pictures of celebrities with products at our events.  Nobody comes close to our results. We get more repeat business than anyone in the industry and we have some brands that have done over 100 events with us.  A good structure and great results are why we are a leader in repeat business with top clients.

Best Gift Suites

We consider Placement Directory to have the best gift suites in the business. We have a few reasons why we consider our team to be the best. We have a few facts to back up this claim:

• Managed the largest gift suite at an awards themed gift suite event for: Screen Actors Guild, Grammys, Oscars, Golden Globes, Daytime Emmys, Teen Choice, MTV Movie Awards, ESPY’S and Primetime Emmys.
• Managed the largest gift suite backstage at a televised event (Dancing with the Stars)
• Managed the world’s largest gift suite ever recorded with 104 brands.
• Managed the only 24-hr permanent gift suite for 7 years in Hollywood.
• Consistently the only company launching products for brands like; Samsung, Apple, True Religion, Reebok and other national brands who just won’t work with anyone else.

Worst Gift Suites

In our opinion the vast majority of gift suites or gifting events are a waste of time if the brand doesn’t obtain several celebrity photos with their product. Here are some things to look out for from a bad gifting suite or promotion.

• Any kind of “Award Season Bag for Presenters and Nominees.”  When you send your products to be given to each presenter and nominee you should know that very, very, very rarely does the celeb actually get the item and even more rarely do they post about it or talk about it in the press. This is probably the type of promotion we hear the most complaints about from brands.
• Any event where a celebrity can take a product without taking a picture is a waste of time and money for a brand. 
• If an event lists a bunch of A-list celebrities as “invited” that usually means they are trying to con you. Anyone can “invite” any celebrity to an event. 
• Check references and repeat clients. The lack of repeat business is a sure sign of how good or bad the event will be for your brand.