From the very spark of the idea, PPAI 100 has been about leading change.
Its goals are to recognize the promotional products firms pushing the industry toward a better future, clarify what those trailing them must do to compete, and in the long run to alter narratives about our medium as a whole.
It should come as no surprise that PPAI 100 itself will evolve in 2024.
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The Association’s most ambitious research project has been designed to serve as a leading edge for promotional products, meant to evolve with the times and the marketplace. The evolution from Year 1 to Year 2 was always likely to be the most substantial of all.
This year, the changes may have the potential to yield a fairly significant shakeup in the rankings.
RELATED: PPAI 100: 2023
As soon as our findings for the inaugural list were released in June 2023, our focus shifted to listening to the feedback of our members on how to make PPAI 100 more fair and impactful. It will be impossible to please everyone in a community with perspectives as diverse as ours, but the large shifts in 2024 are our response to this feedback.
Here’s what we’re doing differently with the 2024 PPAI 100 – and why.
The list’s size will double.
Rather than identifying 50 leading distributors and 50 leading suppliers for a total of 100, we will now expand to 100 and 100. We found that, too often, the 50+50 model led to confusion of people looking for the rest of a list that promised them 100.
All 100 suppliers and 100 distributors will be unveiled first to attendees of PPAI’s North American Leadership Conference, as in 2023. The industry's premier event for executive networking, leadership development and strategic foresight, this year's NALC is slated for May 5-7 in Salt Lake City.
International firms will be eligible if they are PPAI members.
The I in PPAI is meant to stand for something, after all. This is a global industry, and PPAI’s vision is that promotional products are universally valued and essential to every brand.
That means we should recognize the companies in our member community who are positively impacting clients overseas, as well. Likewise, all companies’ revenue will account for international sales, not just those made in North America.
Recognition is limited to those firms who are PPAI members as of the eligibility date, March 10, 2024.
The survey period for all companies, large and small, will be open at the same time (Feb. 26-March 10).
In 2023, we believed it was important to introduce PPAI 100 by unveiling the companies that made the inaugural list and later rolling out the ways the program was built to drive value to even the smallest firms. Once they took the same surveys as larger revenue competitors in July, we bestowed High Marks on deserving firms who missed the cut for PPAI 100, including many of promo’s smaller businesses, for their Responsibility, Innovation and Growth.
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We used the information companies of all sizes shared to create market-wide benchmarking research on these important topics. We’ll do the same in 2024, but the surveys will be open to every member company during the same two-week window.
The scoring criteria for several categories will change in important ways.
These are the changes that could trigger the most substantial movement among competitors, up or down the list.
- The Growth category, which is divided for scoring into two parts (total dollars and percentage growth), will be based on the 2023 revenue of the overall parent company as it exists now compared to the 2020 revenue of all of the companies that are now part of the parent company. The goal is to reward companies for new revenue brought into the industry. Business acquired through mergers and acquisitions is already accounted for in the 2023 Revenue category.
- A bonus and penalty structure will be applied to firms’ 2023 Revenue score based on the level of validation provided. Companies reporting their revenue through the PPAI 100 business fundamentals survey or giving estimate guidance will receive no scoring bonus or penalty. Companies reporting revenue and submitting verifying documentation will receive a score bonus. (Verifying documentation may include tax documents, communication with auditors, etc.) Companies not offering guidance of any kind will suffer a score penalty.
- Also for the 2023 Revenue category, no company will have its revenue estimated – or be scored – above the recommended earnings range for its PPAI membership tier.
- Two-thirds of the Employee Happiness category will now be based on average employee tenure, and just one-third on workplace recognition – PPAI Greatest Companies to Work For or equivalent – earned within the last three years.
- For the Industry Faith category, distributor scoring will be based first on PPAI Credit Profile, powered by Forius. In 2023, a different model was used as the primary.
The scoring rubric will evolve slightly, too.
The same eight scoring categories return in this year's PPAI 100, but just like in 2023, they aren't all worth the same amount of points. Revenue remains the most important category in any company's total score, but the overall weighting mix changes a little in 2024.
We'll reveal what's different once all of the results are released.
Want to be the first to see the 2024 PPAI 100 results?
Visit this page to learn more about NALC and let us notify you when housing and registration open.
Written By: Josh Ellis
Published with Permission from PPAI
