to start giving personalised gifts so they don't get regifted back to me?

[offfswitch]

Firstly I have no problem with regifting. But the golden rule is you don't regift to the person who gave you the gift in the first place!

It is happening more and more often and it is just getting annoying and it feels so thoughtless that they didn't even remember that I gave it to them in the first place.

For example, I have a friend who is a coffee aficionado so bought him a coffee hamper. He regifted it back to me. I don't even drink coffee!!

My new plan is to give personalised gifts. Surely they won't get regifted back to me?

I would rather stop exchanging gifts than receive a certificate for something I have no use of.

Best thing i ever done with a group of friends was to decide we would only buy our own birthday gift from each other. We agreed that we would spend £10 on each other but not buy a gift, i save £10 for Anne's birthday and the same for Jane, Helen and Claire but they don't get a present from me, come my birthday i have saved £40 so i buy myself a gift that is from the girls, therefore we all get a gift we want and don't have to trawl the shops for gifts for each other. We do give cards and go out for lunch to celebrate.

Do people really think that way? Do they also think that you like 2-piece jigsaws or noisy 'books' made of hard plastic because that's what you bought for their baby?!

But why?
It's a bit bonkers to me instead of not gifting.

He knows I don't drink coffee. Whenever we go out, he always has coffee and I always have tea. Same when we visit each others homes.

Stop buying the gifts! Your choice is obviously awful and personalising them wont make it better. Shit gift with a name on it💁🏽‍♀️

Well, yes. If they don't want the item they can regift it or pass it on. If it's personalised and unwanted its more likely to go to waste.

You are talking personalising it so that they have less options if it's unwanted or misses the mark. It feels controlling, not really in the spirit of a gift.

"to then be regifted stuff shows how little they think of you."

I disagree with this - it wouldn't bother me at all. But I think gifts (as in the material item, rather than the feeling/generosity behind it, which I'd always appreciate) mean different things to different people.

However, if I was passing on a gift I wouldn't let the person know as I am aware that some people feel more llike you, and I wouldn't want to hurt their feelings.

I like this idea! Makes far more sense to me. I do similar with my partner - we give ourselves 'permission' to buy something a bit extravagant that we've been wanting and agree it's a gift from the other (we do share money so don't bother so much with that).

I do feel that you can't go wrong with book tokens.

My DM regifts EVERYTHING- so what do I do? Buy her things that I like knowing they will come back to me eventually!

@hideawayforever
"I hate regifting too.
I was regifted stuff from a friend who was a teacher and I knew it was stuff she'd been given by a pupil as she'd already told me what she had been given by them ( obviously forgot she'd told me) and lo and behold i then received it as a birthday gift. This was after I'd spent time (asking her husband) on what I should get her for her birthday the previous month. paid a lot of money for her present to then be regifted stuff shows how little they think of you."

I totally agree with you here. I guess that is what can make regifting so hurtful.....you put time, thought, effort and expense into a gift for someone who means something to you only to receive a "this will have to do" gift from a box of unwanted items set aside for regifting. No thought or effort whatsoever so yes....it does show how little they think of you!

My friends and I do something similar-but-different!

Theres six of us in our group and every time there was a birthday we’d all put £20 in and buy the birthday girl a gift worth around £100. For years jt worked really well, as we are all pretty good at buying personal, thoughtful gifts that were always well received. We’d always say our favourite present was the girls present as it was always more thoughtful/special than what our partners would ever get 🤣
But a couple of years ago, being SO thoughtful started to become hard, and we admitted it was turning into a bit of a chore as we put pressure on ourselves to always get amazing gifts.
So we decided instead, to always do a nice girls dinner with cake and cards for our birthdays, but instead of a gift, put the £20 each birthday aside, and at the end of every year, do something nice all together with our £100. Whether it’s a day trip somewhere new ft a nice meal and activity, a spa day, or we’ve even got slightly over budget and booked a little air bnb in the country and had a weekend away. We find this SO much better now than the chore of gift buying.

If people don't want the gifts, they will regift them. If they can't, because they're personalised, they'll just chuck them or give them to the charity shop.

How is it controlling? They can still give it away, sell it etc.

I only want to take away the option of it coming back to me.

It is not in the spirit of a gift for someone to gift me what I gave to them.

What is so shit about giving the exact same coffee to someone who drinks it and loves it?

I really am dying to know how many times this has happened to you OP.
Once is unfortunate, but many times… what else have you been regifted back, other than the coffee ?

You most certainly can go wrong with book tokens. Not everybody reads books. I'd be quite happy a book token but if I bought one for either of my sisters they'd think I'd lost my marbles.

Ask him, he is the one who regifted it 🤷🏻‍♀️

@offfswitch Buy flowers. Or a book token. Just don’t buy what they obviously don’t need because they have given it away. Then reflect on whether present giving is needed. We now buy for one set of close friends. Relatives started regifting. So we agreed not to bother.

The one issue we have just had, my DDs are adults. Their God parents gave them a pair of glasses each. They were not their taste at all. (Or mine) Not even close. I suspect they were regifted. and DDs said thank you, but Ive got them hidden in my house! In a box of similar silver Christmas decorations! They will have to go to the charity shop. DDs both have tiny kitchens and cannot house horrible things that don’t please them and have no use. I’m slightly annoyed my friend didn’t know my girls better. It feels like they want the big “thank you” but there wasn’t any thought at all regarding the gifts. How do we say “it’s ok not to gift”?

Why not just ask him why he re-gifted your gift to him back to you? 🤷‍♀️

You keep insisting it was a good gift, but it obviously wasn’t as he didn’t want it.

Because its not a gift if someone can go out and buy it. Its boring!

Kinda like gifting milk. 😂

A special coffee blend might've been better, but I think OP needs to give more info about who these recipients are and what their gifting habits are.

No I don’t think you should. You’re buying gifts they don’t want. I get so many every year and I hate it lush set, alcohol etc it’s such a waste.

I buy a gift voucher for their preferred shops/ places. I then get little couple of things I know they’ll use a certain candle they like or chocolates etc.

The way I see it is why not gift someone something useful ?