Employee Recognition and Appreciation

Helping your employees understand how much you appreciate them is part of your managerial job. However, sometimes communicating this celebration can be difficult. So here are some ways to help your employee recognition of a job well done by using personalized ribbons.

Using Custom Top Ribbons for Employee Recognition and Appreciation

Recognize Achievement and Celebrating Excellence

Recognizing employee and colleague achievements has incredible outcomes. When you celebrate their excellence with a tangible award, they will respond with increased motivation and know that you appreciate their hard work.

When you reward good behavior and recognize achievement, you set the foundation for how someone needs to act. In addition, taking the time to acknowledge good behavior lets the recipient and others around them know what you expect from them. So, giving out rewards for good behavior, such as staying on task, will help shape how your office, classroom or other employees will continue to act.

As a leader, teacher or manager, you have a responsibility to ensure that your employees or students know how much you care. When you celebrate even small achievements, you are helping those you lead to see their excellence. This recognition will help them feel appreciated and know their contributions are welcome and wanted.

PRO TIP: The quality of the reward will affect the quality of the return work, so make sure your awards are high quality!

Custom Top Ribbons for Employee Recognition

Employee recognition starts with ribbons! Seriously…start recognizing your employees with these fantastic full color awards. Personalize each of the following ribbons with custom text, a company or event logo and full color graphics. Some of these options even come with event cards so that you can date the award!

Square Top Ribbon

Square Top Ribbon with an employee engagement message of inspiring educators.

Inspire your employees to perform their best work by recognizing them with custom top ribbons. Take advantage of these ribbons’ full color and personalization and share a wonderful and unique message. Your employees are sure to enjoy their new ribbons and your show of appreciation.

These ribbons are also a great way to give awards. Design the ribbons with a message of congratulations so that when someone wins a contest or accomplishes something extraordinary, you are prepared with a gift of gratitude.

Pointed Top Ribbon

Pointed top ribbon for employee appreciation with a thank you message.

Thank you for being awesome! Yes, that’s the message you want to send to your employees. You need them engaged in their job so that your company can thrive. These pointed top ribbons are the perfect way to send that congratulatory hand.

Customize each full color ribbon with a professional message to thank every employee for a job well done. Match colors to your business logo, or custom design the ribbon to feature nearly any message to keep up your employee recognition.

Pinked Top Ribbon

Pinked top custom ribbon with full color printing and a stay healthy and positive message.

Show how much you care about your employees by using pinked top ribbons to help spread an important, healthy message. Customize these gorgeous ribbons with graphics and text to help your company understand how much they mean to you. From a simple “Stay Healthy” message to something with a little more gusto, these ribbons are the perfect way to share with your business.

Another great thing about these custom top ribbons is that they are completely flat. This allows them to be used as a bookmark or another marker or hanging object so that your employees will keep them around. And when employees continuously use these ribbons, they will always remember your message for them.

Hemmed Top Ribbon

Employee of the month Hemmed Top Full Color custom ribbon.

Employee recognition just got easier with these hemmed top ribbons! Design these with a timeless “way to go” message and keep a stack on hand. That way, as soon as you see someone doing something extraordinary, you’re ready to go with a reward.

Custom top ribbons are a great tool to keep up with employee engagement. And, by adding your corporate logo to the design, no matter where your employees go, they will always remember who gave them such a fantastic award.

Awareness Ribbons, Colors and Symbols

Custom Ribbon rolls cut to symbolize the colors red orange yellow green blue purple for awareness

Different colors and patterns are associated with various issues. Many advocacy groups have adopted ribbons as symbols of support or awareness. Awareness ribbons date back to 1917 when the yellow awareness ribbon showed up to support the US military while serving abroad. Since then, ribbon colors have been used for various causes and symbolize various concerns depending on the color and pattern.

Awareness ribbons are meant to show support or raise consciousness for a cause.

While these ribbons are used year round, some of the most prominent reasons for wearing awareness ribbons happen in October. Many schools acknowledge Red Ribbon Week during the last week of October. Others include breast cancer awareness, literacy awareness and cultural diversity awareness. For a complete list of awareness ribbon colors and months, a simple reference website is https://fundraisingforacause.com/pages/ribbon-color-meanings.

Creating Awareness

Yellow ribbon for support our troops awareness

Here is a simple tutorial on creating any color awareness ribbon you might need.

Step 1: Begin the ribbon by cutting a section of personalized ribbon that includes the entire text. It is key to make sure that when ordering personalized awareness ribbons, you appropriately space the text. In this example, they cut between Support and Troops. At this point, consider the finish of the ribbon. If the awareness ribbons need a slanted end, cut the section of the personalized ribbon at an angle.

Step 2: Form a small loop in the ribbon, leaving each end hanging down so you can see the text on the ends without covering it with the crossover. Attach this crossover, or intersection, using either a small piece of tape or hot glue. This will secure the shape of the awareness ribbon. Hot glue is the best option if you need to keep the awareness ribbon for long-term use.

Step 3: At this point, choose a fastener for the awareness ribbon. Pins are available at https://www.nametag.com/name-tags/fasteners.php. Keep in mind when ordering fasteners to go with the awareness ribbons to make sure they will match the thickness and design of the personalized ribbon. There are many options for fasteners. If they do not come with adhesive, use hot glue to affix them properly.

orange ribbon for cultural diversity
pink ribbon for breast cancer
green ribbon for literacy
red ribbon for drug and substance abuse

Avoiding Boring Badge Ribbons – Part 2

The boring badge ribbon has proven functional at many professional gatherings. Keep this in mind when choosing badge ribbons as they are meant to improve the effectiveness of a name badge. The five previous tips were aimed to help decide which type of badge ribbon was the best for each ribbon project. Here are five more tips to help with the overall design of any badge ribbon.

TIP #6 Avoiding Boring Ribbons: Choose a distinctive font.

The easiest way to drastically improve how your ribbon looks, and to keep it from being boring, is by using a nice font. There are many fonts available that will meet most any need. Keep in mind that most fonts will require a metal die.

Badge ribbon printing requires the use of dies, which are made to imprint onto the ribbons. A die is basically like a stamp as it presses a printing foil down on to the badge ribbon. Wherever the stamp touches the foil to the ribbon, the foil will stay printed, or dyed, onto the badge ribbon.

Many badge ribbons may be printed using a polymer die. Polymer dies are faster and less expensive, but they do have a few drawbacks. They are made from a softer material than metal dies; they also wear out quickly, so they can’t be used for large runs of the same ribbon; and they don’t hold detail well, so only thick, plain letters and shapes can be used. Small holes in the design, like the inside of a letter “a” or “e” may fill in because the die can’t press hard enough to ensure a clean impression.

A metal die, which is much stronger than the polymer die, can hold much more detail and will ensure a much cleaner imprint. Using a metal die no longer limits the choice of font; text may be made smaller or even add a logo or other image. Metal dies give much more freedom in the design of a badge ribbon and are well worth the additional cost. They can also be saved to use again and again.

TIP #7 Avoiding Boring Ribbons: Have fun with your text.

avoiding boring ribbons badge ribbon imprinted metal die fitting textText doesn’t have to be boring like straight side-to-side or up-and-down. Depending on the badge ribbon chosen, the text can be set at an angle or even on a curve. This is a great trick to get longer words to fit on a narrower ribbon and doesn’t always require a metal die.

TIP #8 Avoiding Boring Ribbons: Don’t limit yourself to one color.

For a better looking badge ribbon, use a combination of colors. A plain badge ribbon suddenly seems less boring when changes to a few elements are made. If the badge ribbon really needs to make an impression, try a Full Color Custom Ribbon. This badge ribbon will be printed in full color and has no limits to fonts or number of colors and no metal dies. You can even get a photograph printed on these badge ribbons.

TIP #9 Avoiding Boring Ribbons: Plan the shape and size of your ribbon.

Each ribbon should take content and function into account when adjusting the length or shape. If there is extra empty space, make the ribbon smaller or request options for making the text fill it better. Each badge ribbon should fit the text comfortably and not be crowded or empty. Make the badge ribbon unique by replacing the pinked ends with a fishtail.

avoiding boring ribbons badge ribbon metail die add a logoTIP #10 Avoiding Boring Ribbons: Add a company logo.

Nothing spices up a badge ribbon like an image. Use a company logo or find a basic image that will set off the design on the ribbon; it will instantly increase the ribbon’s appeal. Remember, a metal die will be required.

So the next time you find yourself in need of a ribbon for that upcoming event, keep these 10 tips in mind and the planning stages should be a bit easier and more enjoyable.

 

 

*Tips and graphics provided by guest author Melanie Bunch, Graphic Artist at Coller Industries.*

Summer Reading Reward Ribbons

summer reading alpha mom award ribbons reward ribbons

It’s hot outside, the barbecues have been dusted off, the lawn chairs have been pulled out, and all the kids are out of school for the summer. They are running through the neighborhood without a set schedule to keep them entertained and out of trouble. Places like libraries and book stores seem to experience a decline in seeing the younger crowd around for now. Enter the summer reading programs!

But, enticing kids to keep their minds active can be a difficult and sometimes daunting task. How do we help kids stay reading throughout the summer? Why not a summer reading program with reward ribbons as recognition for completing the program? Many libraries, school districts and book stores are all on this summer reading bandwagon.

From reading charts to freebies, there are many ways to keep those youngsters involved in their books. Local libraries strive each summer to provide these reading programs, yet it is still difficult to keep any child’s attention when it’s so nice outside. This is where providing reward ribbons for any made effort to keep on reading helps out. It also helps them to stay interested and not distracted from completing the books they have selected.

Reward Ribbons

Custom top ribbons designed as reward ribbons for schools.

Personalized ribbons are a great way to keep the kiddos involved. Design each reward ribbon to make a great marketing and reward tool for all of these reading programs. When selecting prizes your company might use for a summer reading program, make sure they are both diverse and as inclusive as possible. Make sure to know how tactile your prize needs to be; if the reward ribbon is high in contrast, it will better suit a wide age range.

Getting the word out using personalized ribbons makes any summer reading program easier for children to find and join. Give them a reward that says “congratulations” or “good reader,” or just create your own saying. Try a ribbon bookmark with pinked edges to brighten up any book. Or, create full color bookmarks as a reward for children who meet their summer reading goals.