These 3 "rules" help me gift & shop better, wiser, sustainable-r

Let me help you stay sane (and gently deinfluenced-- or at least more thoughtful) during this week of shopping and gifting mania.

Nov 27, 2024

Hello, it’s great to see you again! I’ve been quietly working on a few holiday “packages” and pretending this is my mini magazine— which it is, of course. I hope you enjoy reading even close to as much as I am enjoying writing these letters through the end of the year. (I also hope you enjoy the holiday decorations! If I’m decorating my home, why not my newsletter?)

For better or for worse, I am someone who takes pride in giving gifts, and in how I shop in general. This is not to say I shop brilliantly— I am far too thirsty for sales to always make great decision, I have certainly often fallen prey to thrifting an item that is never going to fit me, no matter how brilliant the tailor— but more so that I deeply care about exercising both discretion and restraint when I make purchase decisions for myself or others.

This means: no dull, cookie cutter gifts! Banishment to all those silly little gift guides we’re inundated with that tell you to gift the man in your life a flask or something a little useless.

I always strive to gift something that meets the below essential criteria:

Is not immediately bound for landfill as soon as the receiver unwraps it or a few months after it gathers dust on their shelf or in a junk drawer
Alludes to a shared joke, experience, sense of humor— or if not, is on the money for the giftee’s unique taste, home or lifestyle
Isn’t going to drive me to financial ruin nor reek of cheapness

This is a tough act to balance!!

I am sure you are positively awash with gift guides and sale guides, I am too. This is not a gift guide. The amount I’ve seen scare and disturb me. I recently watched The Shopping Conspiracy on Netflix, and I’m here to tell you it’s the exact right day, time and week for you to turn it on too. It is going to dramatically shift your perception of gift guides, the system at large, and how you want to approach tempting sales.

If only there was a sustainable marketplace online where you could find cute holiday gifts for your family that were fully circular and sustainable and had comprehensive details on each product’s end of life and how to dispose of it responsibly and sustainably when the time came! Oh, wait a minute…

I already did that.

I’ve been thinking I was a few years too late to the ecommerce marketplace boom when I started Goldune in 2020, but now I’m wondering if I was actually too early. I walked away from that Netflix doc thinking that what I had already made and parted with was actually kind of exactly what a smart, modern, savvy person needs right this moment.

Oh well. Watch the show. You won’t regret it.

One way I stay sane amid all of the shopping and product noise this season is by making a list of items that I am watching for my own purposes, hoping they’ll go on sale for Black Friday (pants, sweaters, even socks), as well as a spreadsheet where I keep track of what I’m getting for every member of my family.

For gifts for friends, I have a genius plan to gift a trove of homemade and specially plucked gifts in a goodie bag at a Christmas cocktail party I’m having for my girlfriends. (I’ll share more in early December, after I’ve done the deed, but I don’t dare ruin the surprise!)

All of these guardrails help me stick to my budget, not go buckwild when hit with a 40% off sale (which I’m wont to do otherwise), and be the kind of friend, family member and gift giver I want to be— a thoughtful one. :)

I think some “sustainable” gift guides get it wrong by assuming that just because an item is, I don’t know, “biodegradable,” it’s therefore good. There is absolutely no point in giving someone something they’re not going to use or like, it’s a waste whether that item is recyclable or not. These days, I prefer to hit the nail on the head by gifting someone something they will love and use for a long time—or consume/eat! Or live/experience!

Gift cards. I don’t like these because they don’t meet my core 3 criteria/rules above, but they are ultimately the most sustainable gift idea because they ensure the giftee will actually treat themselves to something they want or need. Consider this a last resort for that nephew you literally don’t know at all, or someone who works in your office you want to do something nice for, etc. My boyfriend is the kinda guy who just gives people crisp bills for weddings, etc— it’s old school, classic, and there are some times where it does just make sense, though as a general vibe it is not my style! I like the thought, the mystery, and the gift wrap of it all and hate transactional exchanges. In other words, this is the backup plan!
Retailers with longevity who do repairs on their merchandise or have resale value. Recycled fabric isn’t the only way to be sustainable! Think about retailers who have a commitment to quality and heritage craftsmanship, who stand behind their work with repair offers, or, if not that, purveyors of goods who have resale value and buy back used merchandise, whether through their own program or a partner like TheRealReal, etc. These options exist at a mid to high budget range, but I’m noticing I’m drawn to heritage-y brands like: LL Bean, Lands End, Woolrich, Ralph Lauren, Orvis, Barbour, Patagonia, Faribault, Filson, Pendleton, etc.
Experiences. I’ve noticed as I get older my friends and I are gravitating towards treating each other to experiences: Kacey Musgraves tickets, seeing a Broadway show, a spa day. It goes without saying you can’t send an experience to landfill!! Another way to tackle this would be to gift a membership to an experience, if there are no shows or concerts on your radar— I think a lovely gift idea for a New Yorker is a membership to The Met, maybe with the sweatshirt to seal the deal.
Liquor. I’m not joking. My family heard I like gin as part of an ongoing bit or joke we have and they get me a bottle of gin pretty much every year. You know what has never gone to waste? That gin. I know many are moving away from drinking and NA beverages are all the rage right now— I think a well intentioned bottle of Ghia finding its way into the right hands would be just as good.
Books. I think coffee table books and cook books are very safe (yet also exciting!) choices if you know your giftee well enough to make a good choice. Martha Stewart’s new book is a wise gift for an aspiring hostess, a book on Princess Diana’s style always a slam dunk for a friend who loves fashion. Crazy as it sounds with media and publishing shrinking and evolving so much, I actually think we are living through a great era of books.
Puzzles. People love these, what can I say? Gift a puzzle, it’ll get done. I’m partial to Six Bells and Anthropologie’s puzzles on offer.

I hate how copy paste so many gift guides are, and a lot of the items I see on there feel crazy to me. I honestly think the people making them are just trying to get your affiliate dollars, can they actually think that $22 toothpaste or a portable speaker is a good thing to gift “the guy in your life”?

An annoying, “pick me” quality of mine is that I really value not being like everybody else. So instead of the obvious Amazon, Shopbop, Sephora picks, I like to focus on retailers that are hopefully a little less mass and a little more scrappy, unique, and thoughtful. Does that mean I’m not going to Amazon last minute ribbon sometimes? Or that Shopbop’s quick delivery last minute hasn’t saved me in a pinch? No, of course not. Balance, baby.

Here are a few I’m getting inspiration (and maybe a few holiday gifts!) from:

Furbish has the most fun Christmas decor and gift wrap ever. They sell it on their site and on my favorite Maison Flaneur, which is an endless source of home and kitchen inspiration to me, the whole assortment is dreamy.
My parents just made some dramatic changes to their home, and they’re both in love with it and focused on doing lots of entertainment and hosting in their new space— MoMa Design Store is the perfect place to search for a housewarming-y gift that they won’t have laid eyes on in any big retailer catalogs or at the local mall.
For some reason I have developed a late in life interest in monogramming and personalization, a thing that felt very “White person in Connecticut” to me my entire life but now is appealing to me on an animal level. A customized gift feels so incredibly thoughtful. Papier’s journals and stationery can also be customized, and I adore them. Abbode is like a free-for-all of customization— apparel, homewares, you name it. These all require a little more lead time, but if you can plan ahead, it feels so personal!
If you were thinking about gifting J.Crew— and I wouldn’t blame you, I’m enraptured by what they’ve been doing this year— maybe take a pass at Alex Mill.
Il Buco’s store in NYC surprised and delighted me recently— it’s much more reasonably priced than its neighboring store, John Derian, and there were so many gift-worthy plates and table accessories that anyone would be lucky to unwrap. There are certainly a few hits over at Food52 as well. Not going to lie, my jaw dropped open when I saw they featured a bong in their holiday gift guide…

Want to avoid 1.) spending too much money sale shopping for shit you don’t need or 2.) dropping the ball on the economically wise time to do your gift shopping? Make a list, check it twice.

Here’s my list, for fun. (To be clear, I am certainly not buying all these items— just waiting to see if the price makes a purchase perhaps make sense.)

I also keep a spreadsheet with gift ideas by family member too, all tagged by identifiers like “stocking stuffer” or “under $100” or “big gift” so I can filter. (Not sharing because then I’d be showing my family, lol!) This helps me not get too distracted by opportunistic gift guides that pop up mid-sale and to try to stay organized. It also helps me see quite clearly how much I’m planning to spend— which can be really sobering when you just want to fill up your J.Crew cart with a gajillion cute things.

(Again, if you need to be sobered up at all, just watch The Shopping Conspiracy on Netflix.)

For ease, here are the Cliff’s notes!

Elizabeth Taylor, 1950. But imagine it’s me helping you not go off your rocker this month.

Timeless, thoughtful gifting criteria:

Is this gift immediately bound for landfill as soon as the receiver unwraps it? Or a few months after it gathers dust on their shelf or in a junk drawer?
Does this gift allude to a shared joke, experience, sense of humor— or if not, is on the money for the giftee’s unique taste, home or lifestyle?
Is this gift going to drive me to financial ruin? Or is it on the cheaper side and can I make it feel a little more luxe?

Zoe’s gift idea bank (to my friends & family— do not click this!!! I will be so mad if the surprise is spoiled!!!):

Gift ideas for men that don’t suck or insult their taste (I remain endlessly astonished by how out of touch so many “gift guides for your boyfriend” that are written by women are lately... Mine is not perfect, but I did my best. No one is harder to shop for than my dad or my boyfriend.)
Gift ideas for grown ups
Books that make for brilliant gifts
A big batch of Ina Garten’s Spiced Pecans in a cute jar with a thoughtful holiday card will be on heavy rotation for me this year!

How to survive BFCM without losing your gourd:

Make a list, check it thrice
Fail to prepare, prepare to fail!

How to survive BFCM if you’re a brand:

Touch grass
Exercise
Eat salad
Remember, you’re not saving lives— you just sell stuff on the internet
Call me if you need a little help! I’ve been helping scrappy teams make the most of a chaotic holiday season.