Winter Sports Mean "Winter Awards"

       It's getting cold from the northeast to the northwest and many points in between, because winter is here both in climate and on calendar!  Frozen lakes are becoming either makeshift hockey-rinks or figure skating showcases, the lights of Friday night are gleaming on thousands of high-school football fields, and skiers are rejoicing as they make their plans to scale and slide down the nearest peaks.

There are also the indoor winter sports that traditionally take place this time of year like basketball, as well as the "fan sports" like fantasy football and fantasy basketball.

       Suffice it to say that winter sports have wound up, and for those in competition in those sports (as well as those who do it just for fun) have the need to recognize those who are excelling in those sports - whether it's a league championship or an annual family gathering.  Let's also not forget the "ugly sweater" competitions taking place at homes and offices across the nation this holiday season!

       It doesn't have to be a national championship to merit some sort of recognition for those near and dear to you.  It can simply be for those who give their very best effort in whatever pursuit they've taken on this winter.

       Whatever the "sporting" case may be, we have the award for you here at Loria in Yonkers, New York!  Either online or in our spacious showroom display, we have the trophy, the plaque, the medal or the "whatever else" in awards for your winter-time competitions!

     Check us out at LoriaAwards.com (or on our Facebook page), and have a wonderful holiday season and a prosperous New Year!

For Glass & Crystal Awards, the Choice is "Crystal Clear"!

     When we started out in the awards business, it began as an outgrowth of the (now defunct) bowling equipment division of our company.  Just that you be fully informed, the bowling division was an outgrowth of our original business - pool table manufacturing and servicing.  Bowling, like billiards, were related in their existence as a popular recreational sport.  However, when bowling "leagues" were formed, there also came the need for trophies to be awarded at the end of the league's season - a need that increased exponentially over the years and still exists today.
       Nevertheless, this is how we initially became involved in the awards business in the late 1950's.  This also initiated the thinking that awards are not the exclusive need of bowlers in bowling leagues.  Everyone needs to be recognized for something, right?  Sure.  However, the standard style of a bowling trophy will not fit every taste and be appropriate for occasion.  

      Over the last six decades, the effort to meet the expansive need for recognition products has required inventive thinking as well as expertise in art, design and various material manufacturing.  When we at Loria Awards publish the words "Awards For Every Occasion" as our slogan, it's not just promising to offer a selection of awards that are adaptable to any occasion via the engraving copy, but also via the visual appeal and the aesthetic of the product itself.  This appeal and aesthetic is manifested through the material and the way it's manufactured.  

The latest and increasingly more popular alternative to the marble & column trophy or the wood backed plaque has been that of the "see through" variety.  Initially, that variety consisted mostly of acrylics due to the innovations in the plastics industry.  More recently, glass and crystal have become more accessible to a greater buying public. With the advances made in the manufacturing of glass and crystal materials, meeting the demand for these items (specifically in the recognition industry) has been expedited.

       Here at Loria, we presently offer a variety of stock and special-order glass and crystal award products for any budget, taste and aesthetic - from the most basic (for those on a shoestring budget) to the optically perfect variety that relay mesmerizing refractions of light.

       With our in-house facility for laser-engraving and sand-blasting, we can produce your text and graphics that are only limited by your imagination - and get the job done fast!
       So, even though this sounds like a cliche, it's more true now than ever before, here at Loria.  For glass and crystal awards, the choice is "crystal clear": Loria Awards!

Innovative Designs & Expanded Selection of the Classic Cup!

       You may have heard of "loving cups", but this classic trophy cup design has been taken to new levels of design and appearance in the 21st century.  "Variations on a classic" remind us why something is a classic in the first place.  At Loria, we have expanded our line of "loving cups" and we offer many variations on that classic.

       Just so you know, the term "loving cup" (which is the term currently applied to any traditional gold trophy cup) was originally the cup shared by a newly married couple, most notably in French and Scottish antiquity - hence the term "loving cup".  That explains why it seems a bit awkward to apply it to the winner's trophy of a competition - especially if that competition was fiercely fought.  But the name stuck and that's why it's still here. 

       However, if we look at the ancient root of the word itself, we may be even more surprised, if not altogether shocked.  The etymological root of the word trophy is the Greek word "trophe", which literally means "food, nourishment" (reference: Dictionary. com). This explains where we get the clinical terms like "hypertrophy" for medicine (meaning "fast nourishment") and "dystrophy" for malnourishing - such as in muscular dystrophy (which means the languishing or malnourishment of muscles).  But given some thought , we can see it ultimately makes sense and gives us at Loria a sense that we doing more than just selling award products (at least in a philosophical sense). 

       It also, and perhaps more familiarly, came to be associated with "the spoils of war" in ancient Greece.  The warring city-states in ancient Greece often fought each other and that which the victors sought upon winning the war were treasures of the defeated enemy - what pirates called "booty" and what the leaders of the armies called the "spoils of war".  In modern-day sports, this connotation still appropriately holds as the term used for that which a victor receives after winning a fiercely fought competition.

       At Loria, we've recently  expanded our line of "spoils of war" or "nourishment" (a.k.a. "loving cups").  We did this not only to show a veritable variety of shapes and sizes, but also to show new, aesthetically pleasing designs that don't necessarily look like the typical "cup".  Pictured in this post are some of the newest and most innovative designs in trophy cups, as well as various classic designs.  To view the complete line for every taste and budget, please check out our website or visit our showroom today!

~ Roger Loria, Jr.