The Campaign: Creating a Branded Backpack for More Than 10,000 Amazon Employees

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Hitex Marketing Group, a Miami-based distributor, conceived, developed and delivered the holiday gift to Amazon workers in Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico.

The Promo Pros: Catalina Gonzalez, Costa Ricasales manager; Koji Joshina, graphic designer; Maggee Carrillo, imports manager The Distributor: Hitex Marketing Group (asi/515762) The End-Client: Amazon The Job:  Provide a unique branded holiday gift for more than 10,000 Latin America-based Amazon team members Order Value: $13 to $18 landed price

Catalina Gonzalez doesn’t wait for opportunity; the sales manager at Miami, FL-based promotional products distributorship Hitex Marketing Group creates it.

This proactive approach led Gonzalez to identify a huge opportunity to provide a holiday gift solution for Amazon, the Seattle-headquartered tech giant.

Once Gonzalez got her foot in the door, she knew she couldn’t go it alone if she wanted to land the business and make the project an ROI-generating success. For help, she turned to her trusted team members, including Koji Joshina, graphic designer, and Maggee Carrillo, imports manager. “We worked together to make this idea come to life,” Gonzalez says.

Hitex Marketing Group produced this custom backpack as a holiday gift for Amazon employees in Latin America.

Before the team could craft solutions, however, they had to understand what Amazon was trying to achieve, its budget, the audience for the campaign and more.

Gonzalez and company learned that Amazon human resources leaders wanted to provide a holiday gift that would help build the relationship and feelings of goodwill between the HR department and more than 10,000 employees based across the nations of Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico. The gift had to fall within a $13 to $18 landed price. And, it couldn’t just be any item; it had to be something unique that could be used long after the holidays.

Powered by such knowledge, the Hitex crew rolled up their sleeves and got to work. What it produced was incredible.

Using in-house graphics, overseas production knowledge and the Amazon brand guidelines, Hitex created a custom signature collection of employee gift ideas that reached far beyond Amazon’s expectations. Hitex called it the “Brown Box Collection,” with both the title and design of products themed to mimic Amazon’s well-known delivery boxes.

“We wanted to offer Amazon branded merchandise that respects their brand guidelines, enhances their message, and continues to develop their corporate culture with the use of amazing, validated products,” says Hitex President Enrique Perez. “The iconic box design was used on all product ideas.” 

While Amazon decision-makers were impressed with the range of ingenious product ideas, they ultimately selected one: a backpack.

Everything about the piece was custom. Made to resemble an Amazon delivery box, the item featured special fabric, a realistic Amazon tape-style decoration, custom zipper pulls and a QR code that when scanned led employees to the client’s human resources website.

Building and delivering such a singular item wasn’t without its challenges, but the Hitex team pulled it off with aplomb. “Timing was the biggest challenge,” says Perez. “We needed to quickly get a physical sample to the approval committee before they opted for a much simpler and less unique gift.”

Hitex’s production and logistics pros coordinated closely with a trusted bag factory partner in China to manufacture and deliver a sample within two weeks. Given the green light by Amazon, full production and shipping occurred within 35 days after approval.

“Employees were thrilled with the gift,” says Gonzalez. “The backpack helped strengthen employees’ relationship with the Amazon brand and HR in particular. The client looked great.”

So good, in fact, that Amazon decision-makers enlisted Hitex to produce holiday gifts in subsequent years following this initial 2019 campaign. “The creativity and ability to deliver into multiple markets on time and on budget has opened new business with this client, both in additional markets and departments,” Perez explains.

Want to achieve similar success? Perez has some advice: “The key was working as a team and bringing together our differentiators, such as international sales reps, in-house creatives, in-house logistics and amazing vendor relationships. When you bring all that together, you can give the client amazing results.”