You’ve heard PPAI 100 talked about as a “holistic” ranking. A prominent example of that being that the list focuses on more than just revenue, also factoring in Growth as a key metric and determining factor. Building out a picture of where a company has been recently, where it is now and, potentially, where it’s going, is a fair and accurate way to understand and then begin to rank branded merch firms.
- One tricky part of measuring that momentum, however, is that while branded merch has proven to be a generally healthy industry, growth is not a strictly linear dynamic. External context plays its role in any given year.
To get a fair and consistent measurement of Growth, PPAI 100 looks at the three years leading up to the most recent available year of revenue. For this year’s PPAI 100, that puts the starting point in 2022, which many branded merch firms will recall as a unique year.
- Many suppliers reported exceptionally high revenue growth in 2022, which they generally did not sustain over the course of the next few years.
- Some might argue that it makes growth difficult to properly assess because the starting point is unusually spiked for a number of firms.
This might pose an issue for the rankings, but we return to the holistic nature of PPAI 100. Growth is an important factor – one that PPAI’s research team stands behind – but it is far from the only one. Previous year revenue and six other categories are also weighted when the final rankings are being sorted.
But the 2022 spike – experienced by many but not necessarily all – is worth noting when telling the story of growth. It ultimately has created a range of outcomes because that highpoint year was followed by years with their own challenges and threats of uncertainty.
- For example, SanMar, PPAI 100’s No. 1 supplier, has grown since 2022, as evidenced by its high mark in Growth. However, signals from SanMar’s leaders suggest that sales were technically down last year (it still received high marks for Revenue; “down” for SanMar is still exceeds any other firm).
- Gemline, PPAI’s 100’s No. 9 supplier, did not receive a High Mark in Growth, something it would attribute to that spiked 2022 starting point. That says nothing of its 2025, however, in which Gemline received a High Mark for Revenue (among five other High Marks)
- Koozie Group, PPAI’s 100’s No. 4 supplier, received High Marks in Revenue and Growth, growing over the past three years at a rate that could be described as steady but not dramatic.
The 2022 dynamic created different growth stories for all three of these suppliers, for example, but clearly did not hinder their ability to reach their current heathy status, as evidenced by their appearances in the top 10 of the 2026 PPAI 100.
Why Was 2022 Such A Strong Year?
“Unprecedented times” are technically unprecedented, even though it may seem like you’re hearing those words more and more these days. And 2020-2022 was truly an unprecedented time in just about every sense, including business and supply chain.
By 2022, the world was coming out of the most restrictive aspects of the pandemic. Vaccines were widely available and industries figured out how to conduct business within the circumstances of the world. In other words, everything opened back up, and so the sheer uptick in activity was at a scale many had never seen before.
Frank Carpenito
President & CEO, Gemline
“2022 was not a normal year but instead a once-in-a-decade spike fueled by reopening demand, supply chain catch-up and customers spending aggressively after two years of inactivity and disruption,” says Frank Carpenito, president and CEO of Gemline. “The industry has since normalized, and suppliers are now competing in a far more cautious spending environment, influenced by ongoing economic uncertainty, pricing inflation and global destabilization.”
Since that boom year, threats of recessions, supply chain issues and tariffs have caused real obstacles for industries to navigate around.
- It has been tracked and backed up by data. The industry at large has grown at a slower rate since 2022, including in 2025, and as recently in 2026, as branded merch has been in something of a holding pattern as it has dealt with the consequences of tariffs, among other factors.
“Flat or slightly down versus 2022 does not necessarily mean unhealthy,” Carpenito clarifies. “It simply means the market has reset after an unsustainably high watermark. A better apples-to-apples benchmark might be 2019 [pre-COVID-19], which removes all of the post-Covid marketplace noise.”
Koozie Group’s VP of sales, Trish Daly, echoes that sentiment, claiming that not only the circumstances but the way organizations were using branded merch to try to reinvigorate people had an effect on the 2022’s highs.
Trish Daly
VP of Sales, Koozie Group
“2022 was coming off of Covid and more in-person events and meetings were back on the schedule in 2022,” Daly says. “There were also many companies that were trying to motivate the work from home fatigue with branded merch being sent to their homes.”
