It’s the kind of project that only comes around once a decade – literally.

The 2020 U.S. Census, that massive undertaking each 10 years to count every head in the United States, is ramping up, with invitations to respond going out to residents this month.

“It’s a once-in-a-decade chance to inform how billions of dollars in funding are allocated for critical public services like hospitals and healthcare clinics, schools and education programs, roads and bridges…(and more) for the next 10 years,” says Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham.

To help raise awareness of the count and clear up any misconceptions and mistrust, the U.S. Census Bureau spent $500 million on a multi-pronged advertising campaign with Team Y&R, an integrated advertising and communications agency group led by VMLY&R. The outreach campaign includes television and radio commercials, social media, print advertising, messaging on billboards and bus stops – and, of course, promotional products.

Stran Promotional Solutions won several RFPs to provide promotional products to raise awareness for the 2020 U.S. Census.

That’s where Nick Mirabile, vice president of merchandise and licensing at Stran Promotional Solutions (asi/337725) and 2020 Distributor Salesperson of the Year, came in. Back in 2018, shortly after Mirabile started with Stran (after a stint outside of the promotional products industry), he decided to go after the Census – again. “I was actually the official licensee in 2010,” he notes.

That knowledge and experience gave Mirabile a leg up, but he had to start from scratch developing leads and making connections with all the new players involved in 2020 Census outreach. “I went into LinkedIn and started networking and letting them know I had experience,” he says. “It was all done through hard knocks: reading, researching, cold-calling.”

The persistence paid off. Stran won a handful of RFPs to subcontract with various agencies working on the Census outreach efforts. The multimillion-dollar project involved sourcing 14 million to 15 million promotional products with more than 25 different logos, produced in 15 different languages, then delivering them to thousands of locations across the United States. An added wrinkle to the already complex process: All the products Mirabile and his team sourced had to be Made-in-the-USA. “That was limiting in some sense and created a challenge, but also an opportunity,” Mirabile says.

One of the RFPs Stran won was to help raise awareness about counting young children, traditionally one of the most undercounted populations. Stran sourced baby beanie caps, bibs, sippy cups and other items that were paired with educational literature and given out at hospitals, pediatricians’ offices and clinics.

Stran provided T-shirts and other promotional items like rulers, pencils and notebooks to school children, as part of a “Statistics in Schools” effort to teach grades K-8 about the importance of the Census.

Another prong of the Census outreach involves teaching K-8 children about statistics and the importance of the Census. For that, Stran sourced items like reusable snack pouches, pencils, erasers, pens, notebooks, temporary tattoos and rulers.

“They were all pretty traditional things you would think of that an elementary school child would use. A ruler’s not the hottest product. It’s not going to knock your socks off,” he says. Still, “it wasn’t so much about product selection, but about the understanding and ability to produce millions of products and deliver them on time.”

Stran also set up a merch store via Amazon so that “complete count committees” at the state and local level, as well as other special interest groups, could purchase promotional items with the official logo for their own Census outreach efforts. Stran is also able to co-brand the items with the count committees’ logos. “In 2010, they didn’t have that type of store,” Mirabile says. “This is a huge benefit and huge step forward.”

“Complete count committees” at the state and local level are also using promotional products from Stran to remind people about the Census.

Even though Census Day – when everyone in the U.S. is supposed to report where they live – is set for April 1, the work won’t be over for the Census Bureau or Stran. Starting in June, the Census will send out “listers” to go door to door and reach people who haven’t yet responded to the Census. The listers need to be outfitted in uniforms; plus, they’ll be stocked with promotional products to remind people to fill out their Census forms, Mirabile says.

Working on products for the Census has been a massive undertaking, requiring financial capital and an expert team. Once he secured the job, Mirabile opened a satellite office in Southport, CT, and hired half a dozen people with knowledge of consumer activation, experiential marketing, and promotional products. “To be able to manage a national program of this scale, it’s a massive undertaking,” Mirabile says. “This was a team effort.”

Stran isn’t the only distributor working on Census-related items. Twenty-six states are spending $350 million to get the word out about the Census, according to the Associated Press. Tamara Manny, owner of Proforma/Resolution Print Management in Atlanta, GA, is working with Douglas County on raising awareness. Among the items she sourced for the county were chip clips, signage and eyeglass cleaners. “I geared it to an older generation, keeping in mind who would be coming to the Census booth at different events,” Manny says.

Both Manny and Mirabile agree that outreach – whether through promotional items or other forms of advertising – is vital to help get the word out about the Census. “Not everyone understands why you need the Census,” Manny says. “There’s a lot of misinformation out there.”

Mirabile adds: “These folks have to be counted. It’s important they’re counted so states get the right representation so they can build the right amount of schools, roads and hospitals.”