Welcome Aboard Mike Jones!

Please help us welcome Mike Jones and Lynn Baptist to the Big River Marketing Team.  Mike and Scott’s partnership helps make Big River Marketing a formidable Multi-Line Rep Group in the Midwest. Mike is an industry veteran of more than 20 years, spending much of his early career with Rivers End Trading Co. prior to becoming a Multi-Line Rep in the states of Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Indiana.  By joining Big River Marketing, Mike and Scott now create a formidable “road warrior” team that will put a renewed emphasis on growing distributor relations and increasing face-to-face interaction.  Lynn Baptist has provided Mike with exceptional customer service and inside support for a number of years and will continue to do so.



Doug Lenger aka Dr Promo Retires!

After over 40 years in this crazy promo world industry veteran Doug Lenger is retiring!

Doug started this journey way back in 1983 as an end-user buying ball caps, pens, and block pads. Later working for an ad agency in St. Louis doubling as a promotional products distributor. Then moving to the supplier side spending many years as a Sales and Marketing executive with Hazel Promotional Products, the Dixon Ticonderoga Company, and finally with Visions/Awardcraft.

In 2003 after having had his fill of the corporate world along with long time partner Gordon Blake, Doug founded Big River Marketing. Armed with 20 business cards printed out of an old HP Inkjet printer Doug went to the first PPAI Expo held in Las Vegas seeking lines. By the close of that show Gordon and Doug had nine lines on board and the rest is history. There were many lean years but with great determination and perseverance Big River Marketing was built into one of the most respected independent sales representation agencies in the promotional products industry.

Now after all these years, millions of road miles, gazillions of hotel stays he's hanging it up! Being a planner, Doug had a transition plan in place and it has come to fruition. Long time friends and fellow "Road Warriors" Scott Ward and Mike Jones have agreed to take over control of Big River Marketing effective January 1st, 2025. Doug has agreed to stay involved for a few years as a consultant and will provide in house marketing assistance with very limited travel.

Doug plans to spend most of his time involved with a multitude of hobbies including but not limited to, golf, fishing, hunting, tinkering, building, and maybe a few icy cold beverages at his beloved lake house in Innsbrook Missouri.

Lenger said, "I will miss all my road family that I have spent so many wonderful years with, but the miles are catching up and I feel like it's time to leave this crazy biz to a younger generation"


 

Welcome Aboard Scott Ward!

We are super proud to announce that Scott Ward has joined Big River Marketing as a partner.

Scott is best known for his previous 16+ years with industry leading supplier Coloring Book Solutions where he held the positions of General Manager, Compliance & Sustainability Manager, and National Sales Manager.

Previous to Coloring Book Solutions Scott was self employed for 20 years in the property maintenance industry.


Big River Marketing

is pleased to announce that we will now be representing

Coloring Book Solutions is a leading supplier of children's products to the promotional industry, we also offer products focusing on personal well-being for all stages of life. While our STOP, LOOK & LEARN product line uses fun stories and illustrations to promote positive messages to children of all ages, our content driven LivRite line focuses on personal well-being topics ranging from financial planning to cancer awareness.

Founded in 2000, our friendly, fast and reliable customer service has made us one of the industry's most dependable suppliers, earning an ASI 5-Star Supplier rating and nominated as an ASI Select Supplier from 2005-2019 by distributors.  Additionally, we have been rated as an A+ supplier on SAGE every year since 2009 and we are a Platnum level supplier on Distributor Central.

Not only is customer service important, but Coloring Book Solutions also cares about the quality and safety of our product. We produce more than 99% of our product line in the USA, printed with soy-based inks that are purchased from American suppliers!  Much of what we publish is produced used paper stock with recycled content. We are always looking for ways to create eco-friendly products that will help keep jobs in America.

Our products have been lab tested and approved to meet federal guidelines enacted by the HR4040 Act and CPSIA.  As well, all of our products are Prop. 65 compliant, and thus none of coloring books or other products require any Prop 65 markings.

 


Big River Marketing

is pleased to Welcome Back!

Ads On Magnets was founded in 2012 after a large number of our retail customers requested customized products.  Our parent company is Master Magnetics and they were founded in 1976.  We are located in beautiful Castle Rock, CO in our 100,000 sq ft building complex.  You may have seen many of our products in stores like Home Depot, True Value, Ace Hardware, and many others.  We truly are the magnet experts!

Our parent company generally has over 20 million magnets in stock at any time.  With the current world conditions this has been tougher to maintain but we are well stocked on many items.  All we sell are magnets so we do know how to recommend the right solution for your project.

Not all flexible printed magnets are manufactured the same way.  Many companies still print on a vinyl or plastic material and then apply to plain magnet.   This is why you see many different thicknesses in magnets.  The magnet manufacturers really sell the same magnet thickness to all customers but it does cause confusion when seeing different size magnets when comparing costs.  Be aware if you see cheap advertised pricing and ask many questions to make sure you get what you pay for.

 


 

Big River Marketing is 20 year old. Back in 2003 founders, Doug Lenger and Gordon Blake had thier fill of corporate life and quit thier jobs. After many years working for some of the industries top supplier companies they decided to finally venture out on thier own. So off to the first PPAI Expo in Las Vegas they went, with just 20 business cards printed out of an old HP Inkjet printer. By the end of that first Expo they had 9 lines and it was off to the races. Yes, those early years were lean but with hard work and perserverance they prevailed. Big River Marketing is now regarded as one of the top Independent Sales Representation organizations in the Midwest territory.

 


New for 2025!


Mike Jones


Scott Ward