Gift Baskets Corporate

Our office does a Secret Santa gift exchange every year. We don't allow gift requests, so it's pretty fun because you never know what you'll get.

One year, I got a HUGE box! It was kind of heavy, it didn’t rattle. It sounded like it contained something covered in padding, because I could hear plastic and something soft knocking around inside.

That year, we all opened our gifts at the same time, during the company Christmas party. Everyone at the office was joking about what could be in the giant box. Someone suggested it might be corporate gifts - maybe even corporate gifts with logo. I was totally excited - I clearly had the largest present of all, and the possibilities seemed endless. I knew there was no way it could contain corporate gift baskets for employees, but I was still imagining the box held pens branded with corporate logos, granola bars branded with corporate names, etc.

Imagine my surprise when I opened the box and realized it contained 16 rolls of quilted, double ply toilet paper. It was the softest toilet paper I ever used, but toilet paper all the same. My office mates squealed with delight and then later on, we TP’ed the office. It ended up being a huge mess. The guy who gave me the toilet paper was promoted two months later, and now he’s my boss. When he got the new job, we TP’ed his desk again. We now call him Captain Toilet Paper. This year, he’s my secret Santa. I had plans to get him something super creative and funny, but that didn’t work out the way I intended it.

See, I’m kind of broke. Captain Toilet Paper might have gotten a big raise years ago, but I haven’t. With inflation and everything, I think my salary is worth way less than it was just a few years ago. I recently moved out of my apartment and into a cheaper, crappier apartment that I like way less. So, I wanted to get something super cool for Captain Toilet Paper, but I couldn’t afford anything funny or interesting.

So, here’s what happened on the day of the gift exchange: spirits were especially high during our office Christmas party when we got together in the break room to open gifts. Everyone’s gifts looked like they were about the same size, except for one person who had a HUGE box - me. This time, the box was lightweight and what little weight the box seemed to have was in the bottom. I was again imagining a box with a luxury corporate gift basket inside, which was of course crazy. I made a show of shaking the box. We took turns opening our boxes. It seemed like a funny coincidence when the first few appeared to have a theme: baking. There were no luxury corporate gifts, no luxury gift baskets either. There were muffins, scones, and croissants.

At first people giggled when the first guy opened his box and there was a muffin inside. Then there was scattered laughter when the second person opened her box, and inside was a cookie. People laughed even more when the third box contained a donut. So, then came another baking gift...and another...and another.

I had hoped to see personalized gift baskets, custom luxury gift baskets, or something of the like. I thought about how funny it would be if we all got gift baskets for clients. We’d all be standing around in the break room, examining each other’s gift baskets, offering commentary, comparing, exchanging. Wouldn’t that be great? I love gift baskets. Anyway, that’s not what happened. Like I said, everyone was opening their gifts and the little boxes contained baked goods. Even my huge box contained an amusingly tiny donut, decorated with little daisies made out of pastel frosting. It was adorable! The really funny moment came when I unwrapped the gift and the box inside was labeled “toilet paper.” - even though it turned out to not contain toilet paper. I forgot to mention that most people I work with have been with the company for years and everyone remembers the toilet paper incident.

So there we were, look at our boxes full of baked goods, all of us feeling some combination of amusement and puzzlement. Suddenly one person said to another, "Oh yeah, I thought I saw you in Baker's Boutique last weekend! They were having a big sale." It turns out, we all went ot the mall on the same day to shop for our Secret Santas. Everyone in the office had stopped in at Baker’s Boutique, a store famous for their sales, which happened unpredictably. All baked goods go on sale for 50% off during BB’s sales. I was wandering around the mall this weekend, trying to decide what I could possibly afford for the Secret Santa, when I noticed an employee at BB’s placing a “sale” sign in the window. “Bingo!” I thought. I only had $6 to spend on Secret Santa. BB’s baked goods are spendy, but $6 should definitely buy me a sale muffin. While there, I was even able to get a little box of mini cakes, which I brought home and ate to make myself feel better about my financial situation. I knew there was no chance that I was going to be able to buy a gourmet gift basket or corporate gifts for clients for my Secret Santa. The next best thing to buying unique corporate gift baskets with logo was buying a sale muffin from Baker’s Boutique.

Well, that explained the baked goods, anyway. Unable to afford gourmet gift baskets or the best gift baskets for employees, we all decided at the same time that we would get baked goods from Baker’s Boutique. Only one person in the office had actually given something unique - it was Captain Toilet Paper, who had personally baked two dozen cookies for his Secret Santa. The plate of chocolate chip cookies smelled and looked delicious. As we passed the cookies around, I realized that Captain Toilet Paper was an amazing baker. "I've never baked anything in my life," someone said, looking at the cookie with admiration. About half the office agreed - we never do much baking. Some of us had never even used our ovens at home. (Confession - I am one of those people) I shrugged and told my office mates that I don’t believe in using my oven because I think it’s a fire hazard. Captain Toilet Paper and the others in the office who like baking and cooking expressed some shock and horror at the overall lack of culinary skills in our company. Captain TP said that he would give a gift basket for group to the whole lot of us - if we could learn to bake.

The next day, we brought our baking tools and ingredients to the office. I have to tell you - I don’t have a lot of baking tools. In fact, I have almost none. I have a wooden spoon in my house, which I use as a decoration to make my kitchen look used and homey. The only meals I prepare in my house are the Marie Callender frozen dinners I buy. For dessert, I like to eat candy from corporate gift baskets, if I can. On the occasion that I don’t have office gift baskets to snack from, I eat the leftover Halloween candy, which I get from my parents each year and try to stretch out for as long as possible. When I told this to Captain Toilet Paper, he gave me a look like pity. He said that he would teach me to cook my own meals if I would like to learn. Anyway, I didn’t have any baking tools or baking ingredients to contribute to the effort. I brought the remnants of the best office gift baskets that I had at my house. The more experienced bakers brought most of what we needed. They took charge and showed the rest of us the ropes.

So, we spent that day baking. I passed out my corporate gifts for employees and kept everyone snacking on branded corporate gifts. Captain Toilet Paper showed us first how to make muffins, then he graduated us to more complicated foods. He told us cakes were hard to make because they “collapse” - which struck me as weird until we made our first cake and it totally caved in! At the end of the day, we ended up with three cakes, four batches of cookies, and a pie--enough baked goods for everyone to come close to a sugar coma. No one did any work that day. Combined with the corporate gifts for employees, we all had a great time. We turned our three cakes into a single three-tiered wedding cake, which we posted pictures of on social media. We all had so much fun that we decided to make every Friday “baked goods Friday.” In the afternoon, we make one dessert and spend time eating them together. We’ve gotten pretty good - even I know how to make cookies now! We post pictures of them on social media, and have a following of people who like to see what we’re up to. I still haven’t gotten a raise, but I love my job more than ever.