Making the decision to start a small business is never easy. Many of them just don’t survive for a lot of reasons. Depending on the type of business one of the biggest hurdles you face is trying to become that elusive “Preferred Vendor”. To some a preferred vendor is just the one that’s first in the old rolodex. To others it’s a contractual relationship where certain aspects of the relationship are decided on well ahead of time. In either case it’s difficult to be the first place someone calls either out of past relationships or because you just do great work. We are fortunate enough to be the preferred vendor to a few places on a small to medium scale. Those relationships are huge for us and mean more to us than you can imagine.
However, sometimes you run into mountains you just cannot climb and you have to just move forward. For over a year now we have been providing services for the community of VMware vExperts and VMware Certified Design Experts through a couple custom web stores. Those stores provided a way for folks to select from a huge catalog and order the item they specifically wanted with the proper vExpert and VCDX logos. We would add twitter handles and other personalization for those people that wanted it. Something we were told was not able to be done before from the official stores.
As of today, we learned that although we were previously an “Approved” vendor of items bearing the VCDX and vExpert Logos we are not the “Preferred” vendor to VMware. Like many large companies they want a single global large vendor to handle all their branded apparel and items to maintain the company brand. That’s perfectly fine and we are just not large enough to be considered for that list. Unfortunately, we found out this week that our vendor status had changed and been de-activated while working on a project specifically for the VCDX Program. We had no idea our approved vendor status had been effectively revoked because we were never notified. So what exactly does that mean to us and you?
Well, simply put, in order to ensure we are not putting the VMware brand in jeopardy first, we are removing the two dedicated store sites for vExperts and VMware Certified Design Experts. Second, we will continue to take individual requests from people, but we do not want to make waves by having an online store specifically for those groups.
As folks that have earned those certifications, you have access to the logos to use on your signatures, business cards, etc. In most cases you are allowed to individually order items for your personal use that use those logos from the vendor of YOUR choice. We should mention to please be sure to check the usage rules that may apply to your certification logo, or any logo for that matter.
The bottom line here is StitchTek can still be that vendor to you personally if you choose. All we are changing is that we are no longer going to have dedicated stores showing that logo on them. Instead you can visit catalog.stkpromotions.com to choose items and send us a direct inquiry. Simply tell us what you want decorated and how you want it decorated and we can continue to do work for you. We want to be completely sure you all know we appreciate and love the support, we just have to do things on a more individual basis going forward. Please do not hesitate to E-Mail, Call, Tweet, or reach us in any way you can!