The ultimate gift-giving season of the year is just around the corner, and we can’t keep calm. With the excitement comes a fair bit of confusion and anxiety as to what to give to your near and dear ones. This season, you should definitely consider Christmas hampers.
Christmas hampers are made with love, filled with thoughtful goodies, and perfectly convey your feelings and efforts. Moreover, they are suitable for everyone as you can customize them to your heart’s content for the recipient.
What To Consider When Buying Christmas Gift Hampers For Your Friends and Family
Choosing Christmas gift hampers for individual recipients is time-consuming, and demands proper planning, especially if you are tight on budget. It is your responsibility to start the process early on if you have multiple people to please this year. You should start your hunt by looking at ready-made hampers both online and offline to get ideas. Ask yourself, do you want to choose the DIY way or get pre-packed hampers? But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Let’s look at the things you should consider before buying Christmas hampers this year.
1. Budget
You should have a clear idea of how much you are willing to spend for each recipient. This will help you plan all the contents of the Christmas gift hamper. Therefore, decide the budget in order to spend within your limits.
As mentioned above, start browsing online to get ideas on how much a standard gift hamper may cost you, and then you consider if you want to pick items individually, or just save time and opt for ready-made ones!
Remember, you still have a lot of time, so you may be able to get early-bird prices on most items. So, make the best use of your time to get the best deals.
2. Recipients
This is a very important aspect when you have multiple people to give Christmas hampers to. Make a list with their names. Next to their names, write how much you feel you can spend on each hamper. It will make your planning phase much simpler.
When you are writing their names, if a special gift item crosses your mind, write that down as well. Find out where you can source it from, and get an idea of how much it may cost you.
Here is a tip – Christmas hampers for special people in your life need to display quality over quality, so you may want to highlight the names of the recipients who need that extra love from you.
3. Choosing Your Supplier
If you have over 2 – 3 people to gift hampers to, we suggest you source your supplies from a professional supplier. Compare prices and choose responsibly.
While choosing your supplier, check if they offer personalized notes. You may want to place an order for cards and personalized notes from the same source. It will save you from the last-minute trouble of running around to get Christmas cards for everyone.
4. Pay Attention to Details
Keeping the occasion of Christmas in mind, you should only pick items that are Christmas hamper-worthy. The contents should be vibrant and celebratory, and most importantly, Christmassy!
Choose festive season decorations for the hampers, by picking green, red, and silver ribbons, wrapping paper, cards, bells, etc to decorate the hamper.
5. Check Quality
Quality should be ensured when you are choosing the contents of your Christmas gift hamper. If you are picking out individual items for each hamper, you will probably have to ensure that you are picking the best quality products. Remember, Christmas is a special time, and everyone looks forward to being spoiled and pampered.
Invest your money in premium quality chocolates, wine, delicious treats, and so on. If you are outsourcing your gifts, make sure you are discussing your requirements of quality with your suppliers.
6. Presentation
You may think that throwing all the contents in the basket is good enough to qualify as a Christmas gift hamper. You’re wrong. Presentation counts as much as the contents, especially during the gift-giving season.
We suggest you pick decorative items that are simple, yet elegant. Don’t go overboard with the presentation, you may end up overspending unreasonably. The best hampers are always made of wood; however, they can be pricier than other materials. Wicker baskets or tin baskets are also great choices.
You should think about the contents before buying the baskets. The size of the basket has to accommodate all the contents of the hamper. So think twice before you buy baskets.
Tip: always buy baskets last, after having all the contents of your hampers in hand. For any gaps or empty space in the hamper, use flowers, or candles to fill it up.
7. Plan Ahead
We have mentioned this earlier but let’s dive into the importance of planning ahead. In the simplest terms, the earlier you start planning, the happier you can make your friends, family, and co-workers while saving a huge amount of money at the same time.
The last thing you want to do is limit yourself with time and choices. Planning ahead will surely give you the freedom to make an informed and thoughtful decision when choosing Christmas gifts for your loved ones.
DIY Christmas Hamper
The base for any hamper, including a Christmas gift hamper is usually a wicker basket or a wooden basket. There are other options such as tin, plastic, or baskets made from wood-like boards. Whatever material you choose as your base for the basket, it has to be filled with wood wool and wrapped with decorative bits of cellophane and ribbons. You can buy these materials online as well. Once you get those things, you can even make a hamper on your own and fill it with a mix of goodies that you made yourself or bought from the store. Let’s look at the details of how you can go about doing that.
1. Basket
You could use recycled baskets if you want to; after all, you will decorate the base of the basket, so it doesn’t really have to be a brand new basket. The chances are you may even have one at home, simply upcycle an existing container to modify it into a gift basket.
Don’t think you have a container that qualifies as a basket? Don’t worry, buy a container while keeping the contents in mind. You don’t want to buy something that is too big or too small.
Here is an idea – if you want to gift someone a gardening kit for Christmas, take an empty pot and turn it into a Christmas gift hamper containing gardening tools. Genius, right?
2. Filler
For fillers, consider thinking about how you want to arrange your gifts in the basket. How about biodegradable materials such as wood wool? It’s 100% shredded recycled paper. The best part is that you don’t have to buy these. You can opt for scrap paper, and shred it to use as fillers for your Christmas gift hamper.
3. Wrap
If you have any special contents in the hamper, wrap them separately before adding them to the gift basket. If you pick food items, chocolates, champagne, bubbles, wine bottles, a cheese spread, jams, or anything that is already pre-packaged – you may be able to skip the wrapping part. But if you do have non-food items such as a mug or photo frame, it’s best to wrap them. There are two reasons for it; firstly, you want to secure it in the hamper by wrapping it, and secondly, it just looks prettier. You’ll get full points on the presentation.
If you do choose to wrap any of the gift items in the basket individually, try to opt for compostable or biodegradable materials. They are eco-friendly and reusable. You could also use recycled wrapping paper for your Christmas gift hamper.
4. Ribbon
The last item that needs to be added to your Christmas gift hamper is a Christmassy ribbon. You can pick any plastic ribbon that’s green, red, silver, or golden. Pick vibrant colorful ribbons for the final touch. Before you add ribbons, throw in a Christmas card to show your gratitude and love for your loved ones.
Conclusion
Lastly, if you have made up your mind to order everything online, be mindful of the delivery dates. Allow at least a week of delays, because after all, it is the busiest season in the year for retailers and wholesalers. Don’t be surprised if you are notified about last-minute cancellations as well.
And before you go, remember to write personalized notes for your favorite people, it adds more value to your Christmas gift hampers. And, if for some reason you leave everything or a lot for the eleventh hour, some of the most creative last-minute gift ideas for your loved ones can be of help!
