USB Memory Sticks with Serial Numbers

As giveaways they work well because they have a high perceived value and the people they are given to will typically use them to store and carry their own data around with them – it’s this regular and repeated use that gets the company’s brand exposed over and over again and the fact that the brand is associated with something that has real personal value helps to build strong emotional ties to the brand.

If sensitive data is pre-loaded onto the USB memory sticks it’s a good idea to consider password protecting the data or even putting some form of encryption solution of the USB memory stick. You might also want to associate every USB stick you give out to a specific person or company and the easiest way to do this is get a unique serial number printed on every stick and record who you give each one to.

USB Serial Number

Some companies that distribute their sales brochures and distributor and reseller price lists on USB flash drives do this not so much to track them if they get lost but to create different “batches” of USB sticks (determined by a range of serial numbers) onto which they then pre-load different prices lists (with differing discount structures etc.). When your faced with 500 USB sticks they all look the same so a serial number is just a bit of a safety net to make sure the right person/company gets the right information – you also have an audit trail of who’s been sent what.

For companies that give flash drives out to their employees of schools and universities that hand them out to students, serial numbers are a handy way of recording who has been given which USB flash drive – this way if they get lost (and they will) they can be returned to the rightful owner.

Whilst the examples here show every USB drive uniquely marked with a serial numbers they could instead be engraved a persons or companies name if preferred – you just need to provide a spreadsheet with these details when you place any order

The popularity of branded memory sticks is to a large degree underpinned by their inherent value, their ease of use, the fact that you can pre-load them with data and because they look fantastic printed up with a logo or brand. There are lots of different styles and models to choose from and they come in a wide range of standard colours but they can also be pantone matched to a specific colour if needed.

Falling prices over the past couple of years has also helped their popularity and historic practice of loading cheap unit prices with “extra” charges for origination, print set up, data loading, colour matching and lanyards are now, in the main, a thing of the past. So with lower prices, greater transparency on pricing, faster lead times and a larger range of products to choose from the position of the branded memory stick in the promotional gifts sector looks assured.

The vast majority of branded memory sticks are used as promotional “giveaways” where it’s not necessary or important to “bind” the memory stick to the person that it’s being given to. But, in some circumstances its not only useful but necessary to know which particular memory stick is given to which person and in these circumstances you need to have some unique marker on the stick so that it can be tracked back to the recipient.

The reasons for doing this vary from:

• Memory sticks distributed to students by Universities are often supplied with a unique serial number on each memory stick so that the university can record which student has which stick. This is useful in the event of sticks being lost or “going missing” because when found or recovered they can be traced back to the original owner.
• Memory sticks distributed with sensitive information are often uniquely numbered so that in the event of loss (and subsequent recovery) it’s clear who was responsible for the loss.
• Creating different batches of memory sticks with different data sets loaded onto them. Printed flash drives all look the same (unless you’ve ordered batches of different colours or printed a slightly different brand or logo on them) so it’s handy to have a discrete serial number printed or etched onto them to help create and manage batches. Useful for data-loading, distribution and audit purposes.

Branded memory sticks can be serial numbered in a variety of ways including printing, etching and engraving. The format of the numbering, or lettering is fully customisable and it can be as discrete or as obvious as you wish. Just speak to the sales team when placing your order and they will talk you through the options