A MOUTHWATERING chocolate treat is a very nice wedding guest favor. A mouthwatering chocolate treat imprinted with the smiling couple's detailed image? Now that turns an event into a special event. And it's just one of the many creatively personalized favors featured in this month's story.
SWEET SPOT
With its romantic associations and universal appeal, chocolate is a fine favor choice for weddings. And with Southfield, Mich.-based Chocolate Impressions' expertise, it is also a canvas for creating wedding memories.
Company co-owner Lesley Zwick cites two- and four-truffle sets as some of her biggest wedding sellers. Starting with sinfully rich Belgian chocolate, Chocolate Impressions uses a custom printer and specially formulated food-grade ink to imprint truffles with any image, text or logo wedding clients can think up. With its four-truffle sets, clients can choose to mix things up. “We can put the couple's picture or monogram on one, the guest's name on one, the table number on one, and a message such as ‘Thank you for sharing our special day’ on the fourth piece,” Zwick says.
Introduced in 2006, the truffles are winning raves from wedding clients, according to Zwick. “Clients like this item for their weddings because it serves the dual purpose of place card and party favor in one,” she notes.
GLASS ‘N’ GLOW
Also focusing on multifunctional favors is Mountainview, Calif.-based Beaucoup. Among its most popular new items are glass photo coasters. Introduced last fall, the 3½-inch-square coasters feature a central frame slot for inserting a photo or message card. Packaged as sets of two in a clear gift box tied with an organdy ribbon, “The coasters can be used at the cocktail reception to display photos of the bride and groom or as place-card holders showing the guest's name and table number,” says Beaucoup's Winnie Ying. “And, of course, guests may take them home at the end of the evening as a keepsake.”
For destination weddings or weddings welcoming traveling guests, Beaucoup's travel candles are a thoughtful touch. Ying says clients can choose from 17 exclusive label designs in a variety of hot colors for their personalized candle tins. Each tin contains a citrus, lavender or vanilla scented candle that burns for 12 hours, which guests can “enjoy and relax with in their hotel rooms,” notes Ying.
INSIDE JOB
With wedding favor boxes from the Beverly Clark Collection, clients don't just customize what's on the outside — they can choose what goes inside their guest gifts, too.
Based in Chicago, Beverly Clark offers favor boxes in a variety of fanciful shapes, from whimsical gift bags to sleek cake slices. Boxes come in packages of 10, accompanied by ribbon in any one of 15 colors.
“Personalization is a very big trend in weddings today,” notes company owner Clark. With the versatility of her gift boxes — clients can fill them with candied almonds, keepsake trinkets or just about anything else they can think of, and decorate them with ribbon to match their wedding palette — the favors “reflect the tastes and preferences of the bride and groom, from formal to casual and everything in between,” she adds.
WORDS OF LOVE
Like Beverly Clark's favor boxes, Special Favors' “miniature editions” are meant to be as meaningful on the inside as they are memorable on the outside.
With titles such as “Love Letters,” “Passion” and “Secrets of Joy,” Special Favors' diminutive keepsake books are unabashedly romantic volumes filled with love letters, insights and quotes from some of literature's greatest voices. And with covers that clients can customize online with personal digital photos, messages and other images, Special Favors' books are uniquely suited to weddings and other special occasions.
Special Favors often recommends its bite-size books be used as reception place settings or as part of a larger guest gift basket. The books can even be used as invitations, for which the company provides custom mailing envelopes. Whichever way wedding clients choose to use Special Favors, product manager Allan Ash says guests will benefit from “the intrinsic value of the books,” which he calls a “totally unique favor.”
RESOURCES
Beaucoup, 877/988-2328; Beverly Clark Collection, 800/888-6866; Chocolate Impressions, 866/443-8318; Special Favors, 215/840-3136
