What are the Different Options for Custom Awards?
The material you pick shapes everything else about your award — the look, the weight, the cost, and how it gets decorated. So that's where the decision really starts.
There are a lot of custom choices available, and the list alone can feel like a lot to sort through. Metal, wood, glass, crystal, acrylic — each one looks different on a shelf and fits a different budget and timeline. Knowing how they compare makes the call a lot easier.
Here's a quick rundown of the main award materials, what each one does well, and how it gets decorated.
Metal Custom Awards
Metal awards look sharp and feel substantial. We can have casts made for almost any shape you can picture, though custom casting runs higher and takes longer. There are pre-made metal trophies and awards, and for custom metal awards, hand-made casts let you build a one-off design from scratch. If you only need a small run or a fast turnaround, a different material may serve you better.
Metal also comes in plenty of finishes — copper, steel, brass, and more — so you've got room to match the piece to the occasion. Metal awards are decorated by engraving, which cuts your text and logo cleanly into the surface.
What is a Custom Wood Award?
Custom wood shapes aren't always easy to produce, but the existing wood award shapes give you plenty to work with. Add photos, decorative seals, or engraving, and the result still feels personal — usually at a friendly price.
Wood carries a warmth and a sense of weight that the clear materials don't. It's a good fit when you want the award to feel classic rather than modern.
What is a Custom Glass Award?
Custom glass awards are a business favorite, and they cost less than you'd expect. Like wood, glass looks great on a shelf, and it carries real heft, so the award feels important the moment someone picks it up.
Glass takes a clean shape and a deep sandblast etch, which is how we cut your design into the surface. It's a touch less clear than crystal, and it can be tinted — the greenish jade glass is a common pick. Among the glass and crystal options, glass is usually the most affordable.
Jade glass gets its green tint from iron in the material, and it often runs about half the price of crystal. Looks great, costs less — that combination makes it one of the most popular choices for honoring a valued team member.
There's also "starfire" or "crystal clear" glass, the clearest glass you can get. It keeps a faint blue-green tint like jade glass but reads much lighter. It sits between jade glass and pricier crystal, and that subtle tint makes beveled edges pop, which is why a lot of buyers reach for it.
What is a Custom Crystal Award?
Crystal awards look a lot like glass, starfire, or jade glass, but they're clearer and made from a slightly different material. Like glass, crystal decorates beautifully with a deep sandblast etch, and it comes in a couple of grades: lead crystal and optical crystal.
Lead crystal feels much like a glass award, but it's clearer and harder to the touch. The lead oxide in it gives it extra sparkle that the cheaper materials can't match.
Optical crystal is the clearest of all. It's heated to a high temperature that drives out bubbles and other flaws, so the finished piece is flawless. That extra step makes it the priciest option on this list.
Crystal costs more, so it isn't right for every budget. But it's the material people remember, and it shows recipients you went the extra mile.
What is a Custom Acrylic Award?
The last of the clear options is acrylic awards, a plastic that shares a lot with glass and crystal but brings a few perks of its own. It's actually clearer than glass — not quite crystal-clear — and much lighter to hold. The acrylic material may not read as fancy as glass or crystal, but it costs far less and our production team finds it easy to work with, since the plastic can be cut, molded, and printed.
Because it's plastic, acrylic can be made in almost any tint — mimic jade glass, or go for silver or gold. That flexibility also makes it easy to pair with wood or metal in a single design.
Acrylic is decorated differently than crystal and glass. Instead of sandblast etching, we UV print full-color art and logos right onto the surface, then add laser detailing where it helps. That's what lets custom acrylic awards carry color and fine detail that an etch can't, and it handles even complex artwork with ease.
We Offer Free Custom Acrylic Award Designs
Design and rendering are free — always have been, always will be. Have a price point in mind? Tell us, and we'll do everything we can to work within your budget. From first sketch to final piece, we make the whole process easy and even a little fun.
CUSTOM ACRYLIC AWARD EXAMPLES
Choosing Awards.com for Your Custom Award Needs
No matter which material you land on, our design and production team works with you to make custom awards from any of the materials above. We've been doing this for 40 years, and as a direct manufacturer and decorator with manufacturing locations nationwide, we handle the whole job in house. You'll sign off on a mockup before anything goes to production, so there are no surprises. Start from a template, riff on one, or bring us a blank-slate idea.
Whatever your budget, timeline, or design, we'll match it. Free engraving, free logo and setup, and our 100% satisfaction and lowest-price guarantees back every order. Ready to start? Call us at 1-800-4-Awards (1-800-429-2737).