The Gift Exchange

Last week I had a customer who spent a considerable amount of time trying to find a gift for a few of his clients. He had searched many other websites before finding us, and was looking for “something in particular, and yet nothing in particular.” After getting a little information from him, I was able to help him find a great little gift that all of his clients would love. The New Yorker isn’t your average corporate gift, it’s actually a little bit more. Impressive details, great price tag and quality ingredients make this a great gift to give on a small or large scale. Whether you have 1 or 1000 clients, this gift should be up there at the top of your list for must-gives!

Many of my corporate customers are looking for what they call a “safe bet” type of gift. They’re not sure if their intended recipient drinks alcohol or not, and they don’t want to send something that might offend them. What do I recommend? The Sparkling Cider Basket. Nowadays you can pretty much send these sparkling ciders for any occasion, not just for corporate gifts. They are packaged so attractively that they compliment any gourmet feast you may wish to spread. When in doubt, you can’t go wrong with this one!

One of the most popular items in our gift baskets are the popcorns. I am particularly fond of the Sweet Almond Popcorn. It is a sweet and crunchy mix of a specialty popping corn coated with caramelized sugars and tossed with a generous amount of roasted almonds. It is particularly good when warmed in the microwave for a few seconds (don’t over do it!). Clusters of popcorn and nuts are one of my many weaknesses.

A favorite of our customers is the Cranberry Twist. You can recognize it in the baskets by the distinct packaging. The mix is in the box shaped like a triangle. It is a mix of tart cranberries, peanuts, almonds, raisins, pineapple, papaya, and banana chips all kissed with honey. Yummy!

The Citrus Gems are such a huge favorite that one GiftTree employee purchases an entire case of the fruity gems during the holidays. Soft and squishy, they are a fruity delight.

If you want to try all three of these favorites, check out the Golden Gourmet Gift Basket. It offers all three of the favorites.

Planning an office party? Don’t have time to prepare all of the food yourself or the petty cash to hire a caterer? Be sure not to overlook our Corporate Gifts section. You may be thinking that the lavish gift baskets you see are intended to be sent to individual clients, but oh no, think again. Many of our corporate gift baskets are actually the perfect instrument for planning an office party.

The Gourmet Feast gift basket pops up first on the Corporate Gifts page. Let’s take a look inside. For the well-to-do executives we include time-tested favorites like caviar and smoked salmon. The sweet tooths (teeth?) will be happy to indulge in Almond Roca, gourmet caramels, and powdered raspberry tea cookies while the laidback crowd will be happy to munch on pretzels and popcorn. You get the idea.

The best part is that the entire process is simple and easy. Point and click to order, open GiftTree box, place food and sweets in bowls (were you thinking paper plates?), serve, and be declared best party planner ever. It’s a win win situation.

Summer is traditionally a time for gatherings. Whether it is a wedding, a graduation, a class reunion, a kids’ camp or a family reunion people travel from all over the world to participate in various group functions.

The last family reunion in my family was held at Estes Park, Colorado. It is a wonderful place full of activities for young and old. The facility has a fantastic dining hall, but late at night when a little snack was desired it was always the gift basket that was placed in our room prior to our arrival that saved us. Those particular gift baskets were hand made by one of the industrious cousins.  They were beautiful, but they were a lot of work and it had to be expensive to compile all the goodies and transport them to the facility.

I’m in charge of our next family reunion (Lake Shasta here we come!) and I plan on sending gift baskets from GiftTree to the cabins and houseboats. Granted I am a bit biased since I am part of the Design Team, but it will be so easy to have GiftTree take care of all the details. What is especially great about GiftTree is that Customer Service Representatives will work with clients and the Design Team to create custom gift baskets perfectly suited to individuals and their events.

Another summer tradition is sending my daughter a gift basket when she is away at camp. I make sure it is full of things to share with her cabin mates and counselors. The Junk Food Basket is my favorite choice for camp, but I have also sent balloon bouquets and fresh fruit. What fun!

Whenever I’m talking to someone about where I work I always end up discussing the uniqueness and quality of our gifts. I’m actually very proud of what we offer and can sincerely say I stand behind the company I work for. Our designers really do an excellent job at finding unique containers, products, and themes. Every once in a while I venture out to their office, take a look at what they are working on, and I am always impressed. I’ve spent thousands of dollars here and not just because it’s convenient, I’m proud to send a GiftTree product. There are a lot of gift companies out there, but I truly believe our products stand out from the rest. I’d like to hear from others to find out what brought you to our site, what was your deciding factor on the product you ordered, or simply any comments you have regarding our line of gifts. Please post a comment, I’m curious to hear what others have to say.

Sending gifts internationally has always been a challenge for us here at GiftTree. Certain food items can be shipped to one country, but not another. Nuts can go here, but not there. Salmon can’t go there, but can go here. We end up spending a lot of time determining where a gift is going and what options we have as far as what we can send. As a result, many gifts are returned to us and our customers end up not getting something delivered to their intended recipient. We’ve always wanted to have international shipping as an option to our customers, the need is there and we never like to say no! After much time spent agonizing over this service, we finally found a great partner in Europe that makes this process much easier for both us and our customers! We have an International Gifts link on our homepage that leads customers to a selection of gifts that are available outside the United States. We can’t deliver to all countries, but there are quite a few. We are now confident that we aren’t going to end up with returns due to the product, and we find that deliveries are made within days, instead of weeks like before. This is just another service we offer to make sure our customers are getting all of their gifting needs met.

The first and most important thing about asking someone to marry you is to keep in mind whom you’re asking! If your sweetie isn’t into public displays of affection (PDA’s), then she probably isn’t interested in a mariachi band strumming while the whole restaurant claps along as you get down on one knee to ask her hand in marriage. Actually, if you had even considered a mariachi band you definitely need help!

The most memorable proposals will correlate with your common interests and favorite things to do together. For instance, if you both love astronomy, take her up to a mountaintop at night with your telescope and the Romantic Picnic Valise filled with the food and wine/champagne you packed. While she’s gazing through the lens of the telescope you can dangle the ring in front of it. When she realizes what was blocking her view she’ll go into orbit!

We have some family friends that recently had a baby boy. We were excited for them about the new addition to the family and celebrated his home coming. Lately, the baby has had a few problems and it sometimes is hard to clearly express your concern for the baby and the mom. The Mommy and Baby-Cute as Can Bee basket is perfect for them as it expresses our love for both mom and the baby’s wellbeing. We hope that the baby makes a speedy recovery soon.

My favorite new product is the Chicken Soup for a Mother’s Soul Gourmet Gift Basket. It seems perfect for my mother as she is really in to dragonflies and the cup is so gorgeously decorated with dragonflies. She loves getting GiftTree gifts because she can always reuse the fabulous containers that the gifts come in. My father told me that he never gets to keep any containers that his gifts come in unless he hides them in his pick-up before Mom gets home from work. It’s like the gifts that just keep giving! My mother called me months after the candy was all gone from her Chocolate Decadence gift to say that she really loved the suitcase style basket and was using it as a sewing basket. As a person who loves to send gifts to my family, I am so pleased with how often there are new gifts on the GiftTree website. It seems like every time I visit the site, there is something new, wonderful and just the perfect thing!