Trophies Oxford Hills: For the Team Mom - How to Order Trophies for Your Child's Team | Trophies Oxford

Putting together the end of the year recognition gifts for a youth baseball team may seem like a daunting task, but it really can be simple and easy.

The first step is to decide on an appropriate memento for the season. At younger ages, usually age 10 and under, it is appropriate to recognize all the players with a participation trophy. The trophy should not be too large, because the child is still small, and if it is her first trophy, she will value you it greatly regardless of the size, color or any other detail. Kids know that it is what a trophy represents that is important, not the specific style of trophy that matters. But just so you don’t make a mistake, the trophy should glitter as much as possible. Sometimes parents pick out trophies that are more conservative in color, like wood, or another dull finish, but the trophy is not for the parents, and children usually prefer trophies that are very shiny.

Some hard-core competitors think a trophy should never be given just for participation, but we have found that kids under age 10 don’t see the value for winning as much as adults or teenagers, so a trophy still serves as a valuable motivator to continue with the sport of baseball.

As a child moves into adolescence, they no longer the participation award, and only appreciate receiving them when legitimately earned by a specific achievement, rather than for just playing.

Older kids will not value a participation award, but prefer an award that represents achievement. If you wish to recognize a team that does not have a winning record, it is best to do it with a gift of some sort like a backpack custom cap, or team t-shirt. It will help them remember the team, and the experiences they had during the season, but it won’t remind them that they were less than successful.

Once you have chosen an appropriate recognition gift, contact your local awards and recognition shop and see what they carry. Trophy shops often carry a wide variety of pre-designed styles that are time tested as successful representations of achievement.

After settling on an award or gift that is appropriate, we need to personalize it with the information that will help them remember the team and season years down the road. There three most important features are:

1. League or location.
2. Team Name and year
3. The player’s name.

It is a little work to get the names spelled correctly on all the trophies, but just as actors like their names in lights, athletes like to see their name engraved on the trophy. Some stores may wish to charge you for the name, but it should be a reasonable fee of less than one Dollar per name. If you are a negotiator, you might be able to get the trophy company to engrave the player names for free. There was a time when engraving the names was time consuming, but most modern trophy shops use computers to do all the engraving, and the cost of individual names is not as much as it was twenty years ago. When providing the names it is best to use a printed copy rather than handwriting them. Handwritten names are easily misunderstood since many names do not have singular, standard spellings.

You should plan on ordering your awards and recognition gifts at least one week in advance of your team party. Because every trophy order requires custom engraving, and usually needs to be assembled before you receive it, you should allow time for production.

Most importantly, remember that a trophy has one single purpose, to represent some sort of achievement or as a memento for an activity. The color size and shape of the trophy is less important than its meaning, so you don’t have to worry about picking out the exact right product. Pick something that the trophy shop is showing and you are guaranteed that they will like the looks and appreciate what it really represents.

So, armed with this information, make a list of all your players, figure out your budget and go visit your local trophy shop. It should take no more than 15 minutes to make a decision on which trophy to buy and get the order place.

Brian has been recognizing excellence with trophies, medals, plaques and the like since 1987. When he started as an engraver it was all done by hand, he has seen it evolve from hand engraved, to computer engraved to laser engraved. The whole world of trophies and recognition has been revolutionized by technology in the last 20 years, but some principles stay the same.

Mainly, that recognition is an essential need of the human psyche, and that recognition products help people feel good about their achievements.

Brian is currently General Manager of one of the west coast’s largest Awards and Imprinted products supplier. His writings and company store can be found at:

http://www.alpineawards.com/blog/

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