Using Sublimation in Awards

The Advantages of Sublimation

Sublimation presents numerous benefits compared to the conventional trophies that typically fill the awards market. The most notable advantage is the capability to utilize full color. School awards gain a fresh perspective when enhanced with vibrant school logos, mascots, or group photos. By using sublimation, you can seamlessly integrate school colors into each piece, allowing your customers to design truly personalized awards that reflect their school's unique identity.

Pro tip: If your team or school regularly orders traditional base, column, or topper trophies, consider including a small sublimated “Coaches Award” featuring a team photo. This not only fosters customer loyalty but also showcases the possibilities for the upcoming season with sublimation.

Be Efficient Using Sublimation

Another advantage to using sublimation for awards is the ability to batch print the full-color awards. You can send multiple plaques or medals to the printer while you’re pressing the first batch or working on another project. With a little planning, you’ll find that sublimation can make you more efficient during the busy awards season. That efficiency might allow you to take that one last-minute order that always walks through the door.

Pro tip: Set your sublimation printer to print landscape (length wise) as opposed to the traditional portrait mode. Doing this will allow the print head to do more printing and less “traveling” (moving back and forth to reset the next print line). You can increase your print efficiency by up to 30% using this little trick!

Create Truly Custom Awards

Did you know that with the wide rance of sublimation blanks available, you can create customized shapes for awards? Even if a customer is ordering a traditional style award, you can cut sublimatable aluminum with a small table-top metal shear to fit any size. Adding a full-color element to a traditional trophy can and give you a great up-sell opportunity. Your customer will be happy with a truly custom award, and you’ll have a little extra money in your pocket.

Pro tip: If you need a larger quantity of custom-cut sublimation blanks, JPPlus, offers Fabrication Services to help maximize your shop time. We can custom cut blanks to any shape or size and have them shipped to your shop, ready to be sublimated. Visit fabrication for more details.

We often think of sublimation when it comes to customized gifts and keepsakes, but using sublimation during awards season can give you a unique selling proposition with your customers. Sublimatable awards have come a long way in the past decade, with many great looking options available. Using sublimatable award blanks can also introduce the process to teams and coaches and open the door to future sublimation sales such as keychains, mugs, and photo frames.