Holiday Shopping

First, some background: Where most folks have troubles is with return policies. For example, someone buys a language translator. Wow, great gift! But, it turns out the recipient is not nearly as adept with devices as the giver had thought. Or, there is some other issue such as the giver had been looking at these and really wanted a different model. The result? You can't return the gift, because you have had the product longer than the evaluation period.

• Traditionally, people have required surprise to be part of gift-giving. In today's world, this may not be realistic.
• Traditionally, people have required gifts to coincide with holidays. In today's world, this may not be realistic, either.
• To coincide with holidays, people will order a gift as close to the holidays as possible. In today's world, this is very risky (late deliveries, missed deliveries, stockouts, etc.).

Viewpoint

Think of a gift as a gift, not a mandatory exchange of purchased items (which is more like a tax). This will have a positive effect on how you proceed from this point. The key to effective gift-giving isn't surprise or waiting until a certain day to give the gift. It's communication. So, here are some suggestions to make your gift-giving less stressful and more rewarding. After all, aren't you trying to create feelings of happiness with your gift?

Options

Here are some options to consider. Taking any one of these is likely to be a big improvement over older methods that are just out of step with today's world for most of us.

• Trading surprise for delivering on time. Consider buying the gift a month ahead of the holiday and say, "Please try this. If you like it, you can have it now. This way, you can actually use it during the holidays and have an extra month of enjoying it."
• Trading on time for maintaining surprise. Consider printing out a product page (with description and photo) and saying, "This is what I want to buy for you. If you like the, I'll have it sent here for you to try out. If you don't like it, then I will send it back and get you something else."
• Give choice a chance. An option many people are finding very effective is simply shopping with the intended recipient. For example, Joe decides he wants his wife Mary to have a translator because her job takes her overseas a few times a year. So, they go to Mindconnection and look at all the models. Mary picks the one she wants. Joe orders it, then gift-wraps it and gives it to her perhaps at a romantic dinner.

More about choice

The give choice a chance approach is similar to what happens with bridal registries. It's also what many people are doing with catalog shopping. They give the other person a short list from a catalog, complete with page numbers or just mark up a catalog and give it to them.

In the example, Mary might select a translator but also select some completely different items and let Joe choose. He may decide to give her the season's ticket to the theater instead of the translator, or he might decide the other way. That keeps the surprise element in there.

Now, if they agree to exchange gifts two weeks before a holiday, they avoid holiday problems. Anniversaries, birthdays, and the like are not going to be a timing issue that way. But, holidays always are.

Pre-trip purchases

A final note on timing. Don't order anything just before a trip. Things happen--delivery delays due to weather problems, lost shipments, and so on can happen.

If you order something with a bit of a learning curve to it, you also don't want to throw that on yourself just before a trip. Plan ahead!