A little over a decade ago, an acquisition typically meant a company was powerful and growing. It was a time for celebration among employees, now that they were part of a larger, more efficient and secure entity.

The ’90s changed all that. Now, when employees hear their firm’s been acquired, the immediate emotion isn’t pride in growth but fear as to whether they’ll still have a job in a week or two. Corporations’ obsession with the bottom line above anything else has led to massive firings, cloaked as downsizing, rightsizing, restructuring or a handful of other business-speak euphemisms. The final analysis is, people equate buyouts today with insecurity, not better times.

Naturally, that’s precisely what AT&T wanted to avoid when it purchased cable-TV giant TCI, seeking something to give its new employees assurance that they’re livelihoods were alive, untouched and stable. A logoed product turned out to be the answer.    

“There’s been a lot of consolidation taking place in the communications industry, and a lot of jobs have been lost as a result,” says Bob Davis, the counselor who handled the promotion. “That wasn’t however, the case here. To stay competitive, AT&T wanted to expand its client base as well as services, and TCI’s 11 million customers allowed it to do that by offering combination telephone, data services and entertainment packages. Its plans were to keep TCI intact, and it wanted to make sure TCI employees realized that.”

After some consultation, it was decided to use a thermochromatic mug with a matching ceramic coaster. “They liked the idea of the permanence of a mug,” Davis explains. “The fact that it would sit on people’s desks and be used regularly. Beyond that, the heat-sensitive imprint was, they felt, an excellent way to convey the message they wanted to get across.”

The mugs featured a two-sided design. One featured a special graphic of a cable encircling the world, the AT&T and TCI logos, and the words, “The best of both worlds.” The other side offered the TCI logo and a graphic of a computer monitor with the screen blacked out. When a hot beverage was poured into the mug, the TCI logo vanished and the AT&T logo appeared on the computer screen. 

The coasters bore the same imprint as the nonchanging side of the mug and were packaged in a presentation folder, along with a letter from TCI’s president welcoming AT&T and noting to recipients that the products were given “in appreciation of your loyalty and support.”

To get the products to all of TCI’s 30,000-plus employees, they were placed in corrugated boxes and dropshipped to 250 TCI locations nationwide over a period of six weeks. This presented a few logistical challenges, Davis admits, but in the end everything worked out exactly as planned.

“The reaction to the mugs was very positive feedback from a large number of the recipients,” Davis says. “AT&T felt the entire promotion was highly cost-effective, given the level of response and that it accomplished what it wanted it to.   

The committee that chose the products also said it had a far better understanding of the impact and retention value of promotional products.”