A 2002 report showed that the gift wrap industry’s retail business accounts for approximately $2.7 billion a year. At that time, 31% of that was for Gift Bags. Can you believe that? I also read that the average American spends $167 on cards & stationary yearly. I don’t know what the average family spends yearly on gift bags & tissue paper, but my guess is around $100 per family.Can you believe this? Our families may be spending $300 a year on cards, tissue paper & gift bags – AND WE HAVEN’T EVEN GOTTEN AROUND TO A GIFT!! Think about what you could do with that money! And what a waste – these are all things that go in the trash!!
Okay, so here are my ideas on how we can help our pocketbooks & our planet…
- Reuse Gift Bags. Oh, it burns me up when people toss gift bags. Someone just payed $4 for that bag alone!!
- No new gift bags. What ever happened to people wrapping gifts…in newspaper? Of course there are times when you have some crazy gift that just won’t fit, but most of the time paper works just fine. Or we can sew up a gift bag from scap fabrics.
- Trade Gift Bags. We just took about 50 bags that have been collecting dust to the gym & set them out at the front counter for others to take. They were gone in much less than one week. Give/Trade bags within your community or extended family. Especially if you just had a baby boy or just got married, etc. you have a million single-themed bags that will take you forever to use up.
- Repurpose your gift bags – Gift bags with a beautiful design make great cards or gift tags. I bought a set of alphabet stamps, and I stamp “Happy Birthday” or “Congrats” to make my own cards.
4 comments:
Wish I'd known about your bag give away. We have SO many pink bags that I can't use because everyone keeps having boys! So, if anyone needs pink stuff, let me know... I'm tired of moving them!
Heather, if you, or anyone else, wants to get rid of some bags, give them to me & we'll give them away at the gym again.
I am so terrible- I love actually "wrapping" a present. Remember, what we did before gift bags? There is just something so special about "brown paper packages tied up with string". But, you have inspired me to only buy recycled paper in the future.
Have you ever seen a bag with a smiley face? Seems like in our family one shows up at every celebration!
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