According to the National Retail Federation, the average shopper in America will spend $1,047.83 during the winter holiday season (mainly Christmas) on gifts and other seasonal items.
Keep in mind, this is not the only time of year we receive gifts. Most of us receive several presents for our birthdays as well. Not to mention, all the other gift-giving occasions throughout the year: Valentine’s Day, Easter, Mother’s and Father’s Days, wedding anniversaries, baby showers, housewarming, graduation, recovery from sickness or surgery, thank-you’s, baptism, confirmation, other special occasions, and sometimes “just because.”
That’s a lot of stuff coming into our homes from well-meaning friends and family. Multiply those occasions by the number of people in your family and you’ve got a formula for a whole lot of stuff entering your home!
Now, I think gift giving can be a beautiful thing. And I would never want to hurt anybody’s feelings, if it could be helped. But if you’re determined to avoid over-accumulation of physical possessions in your home, then you’re going to have to manage both sides of the gift-giving traffic in your home.
Here are a few ideas:
1. Tell your friends you don’t need a gift.
If you let them know you’d rather get together in person, that’s better than getting yet another decorative candle or coffee mug you don’t need. Change the gift-giving expectation.
2. Request quality over quantity.
If requesting no gifts is going to be a tough sell with some people in your life, encourage them to purchase quality over quantity. This is especially helpful when influencing gifts given to your children. Two $25 gifts are usually less clutter than five $10 gifts.
3. Ask for consumables instead of non-consumables and experiences instead of material goods.
A fruit basket, a gift certificate to a restaurant, movie passes, a bouquet of flowers, show tickets—these are great gifts that don’t burden your home with new possessions.
4. Suggest donations to charities on your behalf.
It feels great to know that the money that could have gone toward a new sweater you don’t need instead went to a school scholarship that changed the life of a child.
5. Let people know what you actually need.
Even after minimizing, you may have some genuine need for new items in your home, such as a coffeemaker to replace the one that died last week. Let people know ahead of time what your real needs are; be specific. Gift lists can be particularly helpful for out-of-town family members, especially when ever-growing and changing kids are involved.
6. Purge guilt free.
As the value of the gifts you receive begin to reveal themselves, eliminate the unwanted ones without feeling guilty about it. You’ve expressed your appreciation for the sentiment—you’re not obligated to hold on to the object forever. Nobody wants to burden you with a gift.
About Joshua Becker
One thing I’ve never heard you mention is a gift exchange. For Christmas all adults in our family draw names so each person only buys for one other person. This has greatly reduced the holiday stress and cut back on costs for us.
This might be a good alternative for families that don’t want to completely stop buying gifts.
My kids are 6, 9 and 13… they get one gift from their two aunts (who are married and one has two kids around their ages), and gifts from their grandparents (my husband’s parents; we are No Contact with my family). I have been transitioning my own shopping from piles of gifts for each kid to one nice gift ($$ Lego set or doll accessory set or Hot Wheels toy) and an experience gift. We guide the kids on the experience gift. This year, those will be a trip to the roller skating place, a trip to Chuck E Cheese to play games and have pizza and a trip to the movies. We don’t go out much, so those are gifts to them.
I’m giving the gift of Penzey’s spices and handknit reusable mug sleeves to teachers. My mother in law asked for handknit socks, so she is getting a pair of those also.
I’m bookmarking this and sending to family next year. I feel the last few years the amount of presents received had calmed a little. This year, it seems, everything has gone back to the way things used to be. I’m speaking of gifts headed my way, my wife’s way, and the way of my kids.
When I visited back home for Thanksgiving, my mom said, “I got more this year. You’re just going to have to graciously accept it.”
Note: I didn’t bring up any topic related to presents or Christmas.
Apparently, I need to wear a shirt that says, “Remember: I’m a minimalist at Christmas time too.”
In a time of busy-ness I appreciate the organized thoughts that you have offered. I look forward each week to the voice of sanity in our crazy shopping world!🎄🎄🎄
Spot on! We are doing several of these suggested items for the first time this year, as I am so tired of feeling overwhelmed by STUFF!!
Thank You Josh!
Great ideas, definitely something to think about
Well….my husband and I are making donations to charities for our five grown children this year. Young grandchildren : small gifts. I am very nervous after years of uninspired giving. We are in our 70’s and feel good about this change in direction.
Our family has found creating a random list showing the one person each of us will give a gift to (as opposed to everyone gives to everyone) has greatly simplified gift giving and taken a lot of the stress and expense out of Christmas.
Love this article Joshua! We have adopted most of these as have many of our family members. It actually makes Christmas less stressful, more enjoyable and allows us to focus on the true meaning of the holidays.
While a bit off course of this topic, I increased my charity giving this year in an expected way. Based on something in your book, I took some old class rings, etc. to a reputable shop that buys old jewelry. I was amazed at the dollars he was willing to pay for meltable precious metal. I then put every penny into my charity budget and had fun finding new places to donate. Such a joyful experience from a reduction of unwanted items.
You have some great points here. I already practice a few of them, for instance…my sister and I never buy gifts for each other anymore. This started when our kids were young and we decided to just buy for them. Now that we are older and the kids are grown, my sister and I take each other out for a good meal on our birthdays and at Christmas we do something nice for each other. Like baking cookies or a day of house cleaning, etc.
I especially love #3 & #5. I’m going to start doing that!
Spot on Joshua. When I was a child, my parents would buy each of my siblings and I one toy type gift. The rest of our presents were necessary items such as socks, underwear, belts etc.. Times have changed and it just clutters our lives.