Manflower Co

Ok, first things first. The who, what & why.

Establish your budget, how much can you spend per person? Is it a set budget per gift or will you have a tiered gifting approach?

Up next is to understand what the gifting occasion is and who the recipients are. Are you celebrating a milestone? Gifts for staff attending a conference? End of year thank you/xmas gifts? The reasoning behind the gift and knowing who will be receiving them will help you establish a theme and set the tone for the type of products/gifts you could include.

 At this point you’re across your budget, you understand what the gifting occasion is and who is going to be receiving them. During our corporate engagements we refer to this as the Discovery process and typically arrange a video call to establish these details.

Now the fun part, selecting the gifts. 

We love our gifts to compliment each other, tell a story and create an experience for the recipient.

Here’s the formula we typically use to design corporate gifts.

1. Start with the main event, what is the key item you would like to include as part of the gift? This is likely to take up 50-60% of your budget.
2. Now it’s time to build out your gift by adding complementary products. Be careful here, this is where it’s really easy to start adding unnecessary fillers. Less is more and is often a more effective approach.
3. Complete the gift with sweets and treats. Why? Receiving a gift is a delightful experience and by including gourmet treats offers something that can be enjoyed right away. This adds impact and excitement.
4. Company merch, but make it cool. Ditch the branded stress ball and include a quality item that is branded with your logo. Need inspo, please meet Merch Girls.

See how we apply the formula with two examples below.

Here is how we would apply the above formula for a conference/offsite gift being held in the summertime.

1. Key item: beach/pool Towel
2. Complementary products: sunscreen and sun Visor/Hat
3. Sweets & treats: a couple of canned beverages, crisps and/or a bag of natural confectionery lollies.
4. Company merch: A good idea would be to get the towel or hat branded and have that as your branded element, or you can easily add in a notepad and pen - it’s a “conference” after all.

 Another example is for an end of year Christmas gift for the entire company.
1. Key item: something to drink. This could be a bottled cocktail, wine, whisky or champagne.
2. Complementary products: glassware, cooler bag or picnic basket
3. Sweets & treats: rocky road or an alternative festive treat (e.g mini panettone)
4. Controversial opinion but when thanking staff it’s ok to not have anything branded (except the card and gift box), you’re making it about them aren’t you?

Pro tip: Quality over quantity.

Once you’ve selected your gifts (and sourced them), you will have a view of how big the gift box needs to be to fit all of the items.

Gift boxes can be purchased from a number of places however we highly recommend Gift Packaging & Accessories, you can access their website here.

An economical solution is to buy a plain box and wrap it with a ribbon printed with your logo. Other gift boxing materials you may need is tissue paper and filler, both of which can also be purchased from Gift Packaging & Accessories.

Another option is to get branded tissue paper, which you can seamlessly order from No Issue. All you need to do is upload your logo and it will sort the design out for you. Pro Tip: if you have an internal creative team you can download the dieline and artwork specifications and get them to design something on brand.

Here is a list of other branded items you may want to include from a gift opening perspective and where you can source them from:
Greeting Card: No Issue
Ribbon: Gift Packaging & Accessories.
Sticker: No Issue
Drink Coaster: No issue

P.S For branded packaging, check the lead times to ensure you've got enough time up your sleeve.

Need to get internal approval?

An easy way to display the options is to create a slide deck with each slide sharing a gift option and the associated cost. We typically include a photo of each of the items so it’s really clear what the gift is. All the relevant stakeholders can review the slide deck and share feedback. We call this the gift-giving proposal which we handover to our clients after the Discovery process is completed, it includes a full break-down of the gift options, cost, branded elements and delivery details.

Once you've got the seal of approval the ordering begins. Soon you will start receiving all of the product and gift boxing, we'd allow approx 10 mins to pack each gift.

Now your boss wants you to send them to each person individually. You could carry 50+ gifts down to the local post office or you could sign up to Sendle. You’ll be able to create an account, print shipping labels and the courier will come to you to collect the parcels and deliver them Australia-wide.

That’s your gifts signed, sealed and delivered. 

This is all totally doable and the key aspect here is TIME. There are a few moving parts but if you understand all of the lead times and allow plenty of time, you’ll be this year's gift queen or king.

Got better things to do? Short on time? Lacking ideas? We can help, between Manflower Co & After Hours gifting, every one is covered.

Enquire here and we will get back to you within one business day.