5 Corporate Swag Business Success Stories [2024]

Updated: November 19th, 2023
Start A Corporate Swag Business

A swag business is one in which you create, distribute and sell a wide range of merchandise.

The merchandise can be anything from promotional mugs to t-shirts or custom-designed baseball caps.

Swag businesses can be very profitable. It's basically like having your own line of T-shirts that you can sell to the public and make money off of.

Here are some real life success stories of starting a corporate swag business:

1. SwagUp ($6M/year)

How much they make: $6M/year
Current team size:

Bootstrapping a Swag Empire to Millions in Monthly Revenue

Learn how SwagUp's founder Michael grew his swag creation and distribution platform to 2.5k clients, a team of 150+, and multiple 8 figures in sales through bootstrapping.

Revenue
They grew the business to $500K/month
Read by 367 founders

So... can you actually make money with a corporate swag business?

Of course. There are millions to be made in this industry.

But how?

  1. Research real, profitable businesses and see exactly how much money they make.
  2. Study exactly what works, and what doesn’t.
  3. Take action, because now you have the roadmap.

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2. GoPromotional ($4.8M/year)

Gareth Parkin, the founder of GoPromotional, came up with the idea for his business after gaining experience in the printing and advertising industry. With the emergence of the internet, Gareth taught himself how to build websites and saw an opportunity to launch one of the first online promotional product companies. Through his expertise in digital marketing, he was able to rapidly grow the business, eventually expanding internationally and achieving a turnover of £12m per annum.

How much they make: $4.8M/year
How much did it cost to start: $200
Current team size: 9

article

How I Started A $3.5M/Year Branded Merchandise Company After Spending 2 Months In Coma

GoPromotional is a UK-based online distributor of custom-branded promotional products with an annual turnover of around £3m, founded by Gareth Parkin, who learned to build websites for his previous employer before starting the business.

About
Gareth started GoPromotional about 14 years ago
Revenue
Gareth grew the business to $400K/month
Costs
It cost Gareth $200 to start the business
Read by 2,445 founders

3. Printstreet Online Retail Pvt Ltd ($48K/year)

Rahul Garewal and his brother Pushkar Garewal started Printstreet in 2017 after recognizing the pain points in the printing industry, such as minimum order quantities, limited product options, and longer turn-around times. Through cold calling and sales visits, they secured their first corporate order within 3 months and generated a good amount of revenue in their first year of operations. They officially launched their online store in 2019, utilizing digital marketing channels like Google ads, email, and WhatsApp to attract and retain customers, with Google ads accounting for 60% of traffic and sales.

How much they make: $48K/year
How much did it cost to start: $1K
Current team size: 6

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How These Brothers Started A $5K/Month Custom Printing Online Service

Indian online customization and merchandising provider Printstreet, founded in 2017, addresses issues such as minimum order quantity, product quality, and longer turnaround times to cater to both individuals and enterprises, all while seeing over 100% year on year growth in the past three years and making $5K per month.

About
Rahul started Printstreet Online Retail Pvt Ltd over 6 years ago
Revenue
Rahul grew the business to $4K/month
Costs
It cost Rahul $1000 to start the business
Read by 2,406 founders