For brand association, it is normally enough for the company to print their logos on adhesive paper name tags / cardboard tags with no plastic sleeves, a binder and a pen. Bottled water, baseball caps, t-shirts and other such items are all basically a waste of money.

Request that seminar notes be available in soft copy and perhaps the organisers should provide a printing service for the said purpose, to print only what is needed and specifically requested.

Water can be provided in jugs at each table or from a water dispenser, and bottled water should be avoided at all costs.

My friends and I have gone up to conference organisers at the end of the conference and returned things we do not need — caps, calendars, post-it pads, key rings, plastic name tags — and informed them both verbally and in writing (in the feedback form) why we are returning their conference swag. Be polite and diplomatic at all times — you don’t want to be seen to be ungrateful or hostile!

Write to the organisers thanking them for a nice conference but asking them not to give out so much rubbish next time – explain why!

“Friend” the organisation or organisers on Facebook, then update your status etc with something saying “Look at this rubbish wasteful thing I got given at this conference” Mention the organisation by name and they’ll soon get uneasy that they’re getting such public negative attention over their gifts.

Obviously if you have a blog or write a newsletter you could comment on it there too – make sure the company is named and that they read it so they realise they’re getting negative publicity – or write to the letters pages of industry magazines or wherever else you think the organisers might care about the impression they’re creating.

I must say I don’t really consider that swearing either, but I’ll make sure to watch my language on here!

Doing anything else demonstrates an organisational culture of generating excess work (i.e. inefficiency), plus an emphasis on branding and uniformity rather than on individual creativity.

When people write their own name tags they can choose to use the nickname they usually go by, plus they often personalise them with a small picture or even just their handwriting – this can make a great visual aid to help you remember people’s names!

So quite often they’re MORE useful than the expensive ones that some companies have their admin staff spend hours ordering, laminating, guillotineing etc…

…as well as the time it takes to check you’ve spelt everyone’s name correctly, the inevitable embarrassment when you find you still got it wrong for a couple of people anyway, my colleague Nehemiah not being able to shorten his name to Miah so people can remember it, and maybe one tenth of them not getting used at all because people you were expecting didn’t turn up. Or a company sent someone else instead so the replacement person has to wear a colleague’s name all day…

- one conference got all the exhibitors to send in electronic copies of their marketing rather than paper ones; attendees were given a (custom branded, reusable as normal) USB stick with all the details on them instead of shedloads of paper.

- at another event, a company had a water filter station (a bottle-free water cooler, fed from the mains but cooled & filtered) and gave away refillable branded drinks containers – encouraging people to return to their stall again and again, and giving them a reusable drink bottle to take home too.

Also, if it’s the word I think you mean, I don’t really consider that swearing – slightly coarse, yes, but not swearing. I’m sorry if it offended you.