Insights & Guides
Strategies, trends, and practical guides from Brikl for promotional product distributors and decorators.
IndustryFeatured
We Standardized the Catalog. Now We Need to Standardize the Order.
Supplier feeds carry the style, the color and the price. The decoration half of the order still arrives by email, one order at a time. At GXN in Kitzbühel, we talked about who fills that gap, and what it would take to close it.
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Product
From MicroStore to Turbo Store: Why We Rebuilt How a Store Gets Made
In 2022, Brikl called itself the MicroStore platform. Four years and a complete platform rebuild later, the question is no longer how small a store can be, but how fast it can exist.
Guide
White-Label Merch Stores for Creators: What to Look For
A white-label merch store puts your brand first. Compare domain, pricing, products, fulfillment and who controls the customer experience.
Guide
Can a Nonprofit Sell Merchandise? Sales Tax, Exemptions and What to Check
Yes, nonprofits can sell merchandise, but tax rules vary. See what to check on sales tax, unrelated business income and exemption documents.
Industry
Brikl Reviews: G2 Rating and Review Profiles
Brikl has a 4.3/5 rating from 25 reviews on G2. Find Brikl's profiles on software review sites and share your experience.
Guide
How Much Can a Merch Fundraiser Raise? Examples by Group Size
Estimate what your merch fundraiser could raise with one simple formula, plus examples for a PTA, a sports club and a nonprofit.
Growth
Why On-Demand Margins Beat Traditional Bulk Margins
Distributors tell us their traditional margins land between 33% and 41%. On Brikl, the average store runs at roughly 45%. Here is where the extra points come from.
Guide
How to Run a Pop-Up Shop Fundraiser With No Inventory
Run a pop-up shop fundraiser with no upfront cost or leftover stock. Set the dates, choose the products and raise money on every item.
Guide
Fundraising With Merch, Without the Logistics
Merch fundraisers usually mean guessing quantities, fronting cash, and sorting boxes. On-demand fundraising raises money on the gear people already want — with none of that.
Company
Brikl Ranked #1 by Gitnux. Here's What We'd Add.
Gitnux has ranked Brikl #1 in its Top 10 Best Online Cloth Designing Software of 2026, with an overall score of 9.1 out of 10. We're proud of the result. But Brikl is much more than a design tool.
Perspective
AI in Promotional Products: Who Wins When Buyers Order Through AI?
Kevin Walsh says AI will reward the fast and expose the slow. He is right. But AI is also changing who places the order, and that decides even more.
Industry
The Trifecta: Apparel, Hard Goods and Paper
Apparel, hard goods and paper are the three product categories in almost every promotional program. On-demand production now lets distributors sell all three from one store.
Events
PPAI Expo 2027: What Distributors Can Expect from Brikl at Booth 5055
The biggest week in branded merchandise is coming back to Las Vegas. Here is what the show looks like this year, why it matters, and what you'll find when you stop by the Brikl booth.
Growth
On-Demand Stores: Residual Income for Distributors Heading Toward Retirement
You spent decades building client relationships. Slowing down shouldn't mean handing them off or walking away from the income they generate.
Guide
Moving Your Stores to Brikl: Keep Your Domain, Choose Your Address
Switching platforms shouldn't mean starting over with a new web address your clients don't recognize. On Brikl, the move is free, the domain you own can come with you, and every store gets the address that fits it.
Guide
Self-Service Swag Ordering for Employees
The office manager shouldn't be the swag department. Self-service ordering lets employees get what they need without a request, a form or a bulk buy.
Guide
Setting Up an Internal Company Store, Step by Step
An internal company store lets employees order their own branded gear on demand. Here is the setup, start to finish, with no inventory and no developers.
Product
Upload a PNG, Get a DST: Why Digitization Stalls First Orders
The single most common place a first order dies is waiting on someone to digitize the logo. Instant digitization removes the cost line and the delay.
Product
Bulk Ordering on On-Demand Rails: How Order Builder Works
Bulk orders don't have to mean pre-buying inventory and fronting a full production run. Order Builder keeps the bulk workflow and puts it on on-demand pricing.
Product
A Store in Ten Seconds: What Turbo Store Changes
When a store took eleven hours to build, only the biggest accounts got one. Turbo Store changes the math, and with it, who gets a store at all.
Press release
Brikl has been nominated for Deloitte’s 2026 Technology Fast 50
Brikl has been nominated for Deloitte’s 2026 Technology Fast 50 competition for technology companies headquartered and founded. The winning companies will be announced during the Awards Ceremony on 22 October 2026.
Education
On-Demand vs Bulk: Which One Fits Which Order?
On-demand and bulk aren't rivals. They are two tools for two jobs. Here's how to tell which order belongs on which, and why you no longer have to choose a platform for it.
Guide
What Does an Employee Swag Store Cost, and How Long Does Setup Take?
An employee swag store shouldn't need a budget line or a project plan. Here's what it costs to run one on demand, what you don't pay for, and how fast it goes live.
Perspective
The Dashboard Isn't Dying. It's Changing Jobs.
A software founder posted that his users had stopped visiting his dashboard. The replies were more interesting than the observation, and they describe exactly what happens to a promo platform when agents start doing the daily work.
Industry
A Thousand Suppliers, and About a Dozen Can Tell You Where the Order Is
We tried to solve order status for our largest distributor customers and failed. Working out why took us somewhere more useful than another integration: the industry has been standardizing the wrong layer.
Industry
Your Platform Should Meet You Inside the AI You Already Use
The third piece in this series. Intent only becomes a real interface if a platform's actual operations are reachable — and the open standard that makes that possible has already arrived.
Perspective
Your AI Should Reach Your Systems
The industry spent a decade arguing about data formats and almost none on whether anyone's tools can actually reach each other. Buyers now arrive with an AI client of their own — and the question has changed.
Industry
AI as the New Interface — For Those Who Want It
For decades, using software meant learning where the buttons are. What changes when you can just say what you want — and why the screens still stay.
Industry
Everyone in Promo Is Using AI. Almost No One Is Using It Natively.
Promo has adopted AI almost universally — and integrated it almost nowhere. Why bolt-on AI hits a ceiling, and what AI-native actually means for our industry.
Industry
PPAI Is Embracing “Branded Merchandise”
PPAI is moving the industry's language from 'promotional products' to 'branded merchandise.' A 15,000-member Facebook group has already renamed itself to match — here's what's changing, and why the word fits.
Industry
Branded Merch vs. Promotional Products: Why the Words You Use Decide Who Finds You
Buyers search for 'branded merch.' The industry sells 'promotional products.' That gap in language is quietly deciding who gets found — here's how to speak the buyer's term without losing the trade's.
Platform
Business Cards, On Demand: Adding Personalized Print to Your Merch Stores
Business card programs have always been a separate, manual exercise. Now you can add personalized, on-demand business cards to the same store your clients already use for apparel and hard goods.
Guide
How Creators and Influencers Earn From a Branded Merch Store
Your audience already wants to represent you. A branded merch store turns that into revenue — with no inventory, your own margin on every sale, and coupons to launch the drop.
Guide
Flat vs. Percentage: How to Run a Merch Fundraiser That Scales
A merch fundraiser can raise a set dollar amount per item — or a percentage of the price that scales with every sale. Here's when to use each, and how to run a drive that funds itself on demand on Brikl.
Operations
One Store Per Department: Running Multi-Team Merch With Sub-Organizations
Big organizations don't need one giant merch store — they need many small ones that stay on brand. Sub-organizations give every department its own store while central admins keep control.
Growth
Coupons That Actually Move Merch
A coupon code is more than a discount — it's a reason to buy now. Here's how to use percentage and fixed-amount coupons to launch drops, reward audiences, and clear seasonal merch.
Industry
Printful Enterprise's Full Catalog Is Now Live in the Brikl Marketplace
Brikl launches its Printful Enterprise integration — 1,000+ on-demand products across apparel, drinkware, home goods, pet products, stationery, and more, now available directly inside every Brikl-powered distributor store.
Guide
How to Manage Employee Swag Across Multiple Offices and Countries
Most companies run branded swag through a combination of bulk orders, agency drops, and ad-hoc requests. A permanent branded store changes all of that — here's how corporate teams are using Brikl.
Guide
Gym Apparel Without the Inventory Risk: How Fitness Studios Are Running On-Demand Merch
Most gyms carry boxes of unsold shirts in the back room. Here's how fitness studios are switching to on-demand branded stores where members order what they want, when they want it.
Guide
How Nonprofits Launch a Branded Merch Store Without the Overhead
Most nonprofits run merch campaigns that open, close, and disappear. Here's how to run an always-on branded store that funds your mission without touching inventory.
Guide
Running a Club or Team Store Without Bulk Orders or Box Logistics
Sports clubs have been running kit orders through spreadsheets and bulk orders for years. Here's how clubs are switching to on-demand stores where every player orders their own size.
Guide
Running Spirit Wear, Athletics, and PTA Stores on One Platform
Most schools run spirit wear, athletic uniforms, PTA fundraisers and faculty stores on spreadsheets, bulk orders and separate vendors. There is a better way, and it fits on one platform.
Growth
Why Personalization Matters for Promotional Product Distributors
Team stores, corporate programs, and school spirit shops all share one need: every item should feel like it belongs to the person wearing it. Without built-in personalization, distributors lose hours to spreadsheets, typos, and re-keyed orders. Here's why personalization belongs inside the product on Brikl, not in an inbox.
Industry
What's New in the Brikl Marketplace: January → April 2026
The marketplace grew from 3,799 to 4,677 products between January and April 2026 — adding a new fulfillment partner and significant depth across apparel, drinkware, and tech.
Industry
How to Find Made-in-USA Products in the Brikl Marketplace
From American Apparel jersey tees to Cap America beanies, Bayside hooded sweatshirts to SOCCO crew socks — the Brikl marketplace carries an explicitly USA-made shelf you can curate for clients who require it.
Growth
The Fastest Way to Launch On-Demand Stores
From blank page to live, branded storefront in roughly 22 minutes — without inventory, without bulk minimums, and without writing a single line of code.
Industry
How to Find Sustainable Products in the Brikl Marketplace
From organic cotton to recycled polyester to bamboo and hemp — the Brikl marketplace carries sustainable products across four distinct categories. Here's how to recognise them and build a curated shelf for your clients.
Platform
Five Things Brikl Replaces for Distributors
Order emails, artwork ping-pong, blank sourcing, invoicing, and sales tax — here's what goes away when you move to Brikl.
Growth
More Stores Should Mean More Revenue — Not More Work
Most distributors hit a ceiling — not because they run out of clients, but because every new store adds more admin. Here's how to break the linear scaling trap.
Growth
Hoodies, Business Cards, and Tumblers — in One Store
Print and promo have been separate industries for over a century. Mixed stores — where a client orders apparel, print products, and hard goods from one storefront — are changing that.
Operations
On-Demand Isn't About Minimums — It's About Eliminating Every Manual Touchpoint
The industry equates on-demand with no minimums. But the real breakthrough is end-to-end automation — and the minimum of 1 is just a byproduct.
Growth
8 Features Every On-Demand Company Store Must Have in 2026
A checklist of the capabilities that separate real on-demand store platforms from adapted e-commerce tools — based on what promotional product distributors actually need.
Operations
The Real Cost of Selling Promo: A Margin Breakdown
A transparent breakdown of what it actually costs to sell promotional products on-demand — with real numbers, real fees, and real profit margins.
Education
What Is Print on Demand? A Complete Guide for Promotional Product Distributors
Print on demand lets distributors sell custom products without holding inventory. Here's how the model works and why it's reshaping the promo industry.
Growth
Company Store Best Practices: 7 Ways to Keep Employees Ordering
Most company stores fail because they're treated as catalogs, not experiences. Here are the practices that drive repeat purchases.
Industry
The Complete Guide to B2B Merchandise Programs
Everything promotional product distributors need to know about building, managing and scaling B2B merchandise programs for corporate clients, from the first conversation to the hundredth reorder.
Education
Screen Printing vs. Embroidery vs. DTG: Choosing the Right Decoration Method
A technical comparison of the six most common decoration methods in promotional products — when to use each and how they affect cost, quality, and turnaround.
Education
How On-Demand Fulfillment Works in Promotional Products
A step-by-step breakdown of the on-demand fulfillment process — from order placement to delivery — and why it's replacing traditional inventory models.
Industry
PPAI Expo 2026: What We Learned at Booth #3508
Key takeaways from PPAI Expo 2026 in Las Vegas — on-demand adoption is accelerating faster than anyone expected.
Operations
How to Scale One-Off Orders Without the Sourcing Headache
Single-piece orders are where distributors lose money — sourcing, decoration, and shipping costs eat the margin. Here's how an on-demand network changes the unit economics.
Company
Brikl and The Vernon Company Win the First PromoStandards Hack-A-Thon
A team of five Brikl staff and Lisa Hubbard of The Vernon Company has won first place in the first-ever PromoStandards Hack-A-Thon. Our working demo showed that a platform can integrate with PromoStandards in 90 seconds.
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