Make Your Own Inexpensive Promo Key Chains

I've been looking at promotional key chains for a while now, because personally I love collecting key chains and find that they're always put to good use. But the plastic key chains offered by promo places charge setup fees and imprint charges, and require bulk orders to keep their printing costs low. I just can't see spending $200+ for items that people will just walk off with and throw away later. So I discovered a cheap alternative that will allow me to use color images for my key chains and create only what I need at any given moment for promotional use.

Items required (and cost):

• "Design Your Own" key chain kit. You can purchase these through wholesale dealers such as Oriental Trading, where a dozen (12) key chains cost only $3.95 plus shipping. Look for the key chains that allow you to add photos or your own designs. Oriental Trading has photo key chains, DIY color/design key chains, and scrapbooking key chains as well, in a variety of sizes. The ones I used in this project were the rectangular key chains that are roughly 2" x 1.5" in size.
• Images to use on the key chain. Authors, use your latest book covers -- you can make a limited amount of key chains without committing to one design. Bands and musicians, use a high resolution image (300 DPI or greater) of your logo or album cover. Artists, let your artwork shine! Or, you can can download stock photographs online at places like Dreamstime or iStockPhoto for about $1 an image.
• Microsoft Word. Of course, you can make these without it, but the template I created opens in Word. Click here to download the template (virus free, I assure you). If you don't have Word, you will need a word processing program that allows you to create text boxes or tables whose cells can be fixed in size.
• A color printer OR a print shop where you can print the images.
  

To Create Your Key Chains:

1. Open the template in Word. If you don't have Word, open your word processing software and create a new document, legal size (8½" x 14") landscape orientation. Then create a table that is six columns of 2" in width by five rows of 1.38" in height. In my template, I've already created this document for you. There are 30 boxes on one page, and each box is 2″ x 1.38″ in size. One keychain will take 2 boxes, one for each side. Use Word's Insert Image feature to add your pictures to your key chain.

For my key chains, I decided to use my URL logo and website tagline on one side and an image on the other. The images were taken from a marketing brochure I created earlier this year, to tie the key chains in with my "brand" and make them recognizable to people familiar with my work. I had two images, and decided to use them both. One side of all key chains would be my URL; the other side would be an image.

Make sure to leave a line delineating the cells, as this makes the images easier to cut when printed.

2. Once you've designed both sides of your key chain, cut and paste the boxes to fill the entire page. Remember, you need two boxes for each key chain, so make sure you create enough to fill all the key chains you ordered. The template prints on legal sized paper (8½" x 14) and will make 15 key chains. As the DIY sets sell by the dozen, this will give you two extra, but eh, they're little.

3. Print the page yourself, or upload/save it to have a print shop do it for you. I had mine done at Staples and it was just over a dollar in cost, which I felt was more than reasonable.

4. Cut out the key chain images using the solid lines as a guide.

5. Place one side into the key chain, face down. Add the second side on top of it, face up, then snap on the acrylic cover. Press down completely to ensure that it locks into place.

6. Presto! Instant key chain! At about $5 per dozen, or about 40¢ each, your key chains are personalized and will make great promo items. You can reorder the DIY kits whenever you want to make another dozen or so, and change up the images to promote your most current books. The plus side is, you're not stuck with hundreds of key chains or only one design.