Episode 202 – Gift cupboard organising

Have you got a gift cupboard in your house and by that we mean a selection of presents ready to gift to friends or family on the next special occasion? In this podcast we’re going to talk about the pros and cons of having one.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
[00:00:00] Ingrid: Have you got a gift covered in your house? And by that we mean a selection of presents ready to gift to friends and family on the next special occasion. In this podcast, we're going to talk about the pros and cons of having one. I.

[00:00:17] So Lesley, in this podcast, we're going to talk about gift cupboards. 

[00:00:23] Lesley: Yeah. I feel like it might be a little bit ranty. 

[00:00:26] I'm not going to lie. They're not my favorite thing. I do find there are many more cons than prose. I'm not going to lie, but I think before we get started, I feel like we might alienate some people because some people will love their gift cupboard, and I know in amongst our listeners there'll be, there will be 75 to 90% of people that will have one.

[00:00:51] Am I right, Ingrid? You know it. 

[00:00:55] Ingrid: We see them a lot in people's houses, or maybe not even, I mean, in my head, a gift cupboard is like a shelf or a cupboard somewhere where everything is like neatly put in or what. What we know from working in clients' houses and being realistic about this is that. People love to have that, but what they end up with having gifts scattered all over the their houses and completely forgetting that they've actually bought something for someone.

[00:01:25] I know. 

[00:01:26] Lesley: Let's cut to the chase here. The reason why, you know, the people who listen to this podcast are people who like stuff and typically like buying stuff, or certainly have liked buying stuff in the past. Hopefully they're on a journey towards, you know, change. But at the moment, People are here because they have amassed stuff over the years and buying gifts for other people and buying things, typically bargains as you see them, thinking that they will come in for somebody is something that makes us feel less guilty.

[00:01:55] 'cause actually we're buying it for somebody else and not for ourselves. And so there's a lot of, a lot of emotions and habits wrapped up in a gift cupboard. And so I think this might be quite obvious, Ingrid. Do I have a gift cupboard? I do not. Do you,

[00:02:14] do you have a gift cupboard? 

[00:02:16] Ingrid: Ingrid? I used to have a gift cupboard, so 

[00:02:19] Lesley: when I used to have one as well. I used to have. I used to have one. We'll talk a little bit more about 

[00:02:23] Ingrid: that later. Yeah, so I do not have a gift cupboard anymore, but maybe that's, Possibly, and I'm holding my, my hand to my heart probably because I'm not a great gift giver.

[00:02:36] Honestly. I'm not really good at doing gifts. I'm good at other stuff, but gift giving is not on in my strong arena of things that I do. 

[00:02:47] Lesley: So you're not a good gift giver. Okay. I don't 

[00:02:49] Ingrid: think. Well, maybe. I don't know. I bought you a wine opener. I thought that was an excellent gift. You did. You bought, you bought me some 

[00:02:54] Lesley: nice gifts.

[00:02:55] Actually, you bought me a candle last time. Even though you don't like candles, you bought me a candle last time. Time came up, uh, my corkscrew broke and you bought me a new corkscrew. Yeah. Uh, you've bought me lots of champagne and stuff along the way. You've bought me chocolates, 

[00:03:09] Ingrid: haven't you? Yeah. Maybe I am better at gifts than I'll give myself credit for actually.

[00:03:14] Lesley: Yeah. But you know me well, you know me well, you know exactly what's going to hit the spot. I think that's, and so, Right. We need to be real honest. We need to be realistic here about gift cupboard and everything is, it's going to be very dependent on what your lifestyle looks like. Yeah. The whole idea of this podcast is to try and appeal to those people who are randomly buying things without intention.

[00:03:36] I think now there are plenty of you who are buying with intention and using a gift cupboard optimally, but there are many of you po. Possibly I'd like to go out on a limb and say more of you are doing it. Unintentionally and just buying it because things look like their bargains that's going to come in.

[00:03:54] I'm definitely going to need that someday. And maybe the organisation of that gift cupboard is not what it needs to be. And that's what we're going to talk about. So I don't have a gift cupboard. You did have a gift cupboard and I did have a gift cupboard. When did we have a gift cupboard and why? 

[00:04:08] Ingrid: I had a gift cupboard when the kids were little and you suddenly get handed this random invitation to go to a party and it's like, Over the weekend or next weekend, and I found it with small children, quite hard to.

[00:04:24] Suddenly go out and buy a gift. I mean, and we were talking like 7, 8, 9 years ago. I mean, no Amazon Prime, that you could just order something that delivers the same day. So you kind of, and you wanted to go to like a, a, a toy store or something, or look at crafts and wanted to look at the box and finding something online at the time didn't really work for me.

[00:04:45] I want to see something that I buy. So at the time I was like, okay, I don't have time to do that all the time. Let me buy when I went into the shop. Let me buy a couple of things because I know that will come in handy. I know we're going to have a couple of parties coming up throughout the school year. I wouldn't go mad and have like 25 gifts ready to go, but just always have a couple there.

[00:05:10] So you would never kind of run out and then be embarrassed that your child can't, can't bring a prison. Because I think, you know, that would not something be there, something that I would want to do. There's a couple of things 

[00:05:20] Lesley: that I want to say about that. Ingrid, I, I believe, I don't know for definite, but I, 'cause I've not got that age of children anymore, but I think that things might have moved on a little bit when it, when it comes to giving gifts, uh, uh, you know, when there's kids' parties and stuff like that.

[00:05:33] I, I think, I hope anyway, I. That people tend to club together a little bit more. Maybe give money so somebody can get one big thing that they want rather than loads of little things. Because I think there is definitely, people know that there's so much stuff coming into particularly kids' worlds and is kind of fighting against that a little bit.

[00:05:50] So I think that perhaps they, they, I, you know, when we, when our kids were little, they would get 30 gifts for a fiver or whatever, wouldn't it? And it's just ridiculous. But the reason why something like that, um, and. Buying things for children, for children's parties and things like that is because actually you don't really know the child that well and so you're just buying something that was, is age appropriate?

[00:06:11] Yeah. You're just buying an age appropriate, um, gift for somebody that is. Yeah, I'm, I'm, so you don't need to be specific about that. Yeah. And so it's an intentional purchase for a seven year old child. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And so that's as intentional as it needs to be. And that's why it works. You know, you're going to have those parties and you know that there's probably going to be at least 10 of them in a year.

[00:06:32] You know, pretty much how, what kind of budget you're going to spend, because that's fairly set, isn't it? Yeah. And you know that it's, so that kind of works for me and that did work for me. And so you can pick things up as you go. 'cause it's a bit of a pain when you're out and about. You know, you with your kids and everything.

[00:06:46] It's busy life and you need to pick things up as you see them. But now I think we see a lot of people who are buying just random things like candles, like makeup, things that are on sale, like clothes that, like all that'll come in for somebody and not knowing who that is or what that occasion is going to be.

[00:07:06] And I think that, you know, we. We've seen it. The reason why we feel so strongly about it is because we see these things as not being useful, because they are, they're more clutter because what happens as, as Ingrid rightly says, is that they're scattered all around the house and people forget when it comes to a special occasion that they bought it 'cause it wasn't intentionally purchased.

[00:07:25] Ingrid: Yeah, and it gets put down somewhere. You know, they come back from, from a shopping trip, it's the back, it's puts down somewhere, something else goes on top of it. It goes outta sight out of mind. There might not be the right structures in place yet. So it is some, I know I've bought something, but it's somewhere out here in this house, but I'm not completely sure where I put it down at the time.

[00:07:46] So where is it disappear to? And the thing is, When something gets put down somewhere, it's really easy for it to get damaged, to get broken, to get a bit crumpled. You know, people buy books, you know, as well. But of course, a book, especially if it's not a hard cover, as soon as something else gets put on top of it, you get these, you know, the, the, the corners.

[00:08:08] You get cracks in the cover, you know, and then you don't want to gift it anymore because it doesn't look really nice. 

[00:08:14] Lesley: I know that's the problem, isn't it? But you know, it's not up for us to say really whether people want to do this or don't want to do this. It might depend on where you live. You know, one of our members lives in a really remote island.

[00:08:25] You know, it might be more difficult for her to get things. Yeah. You might, you know, if you live very rurally, you might not be able to get Amazon delivered by 7:00 PM tonight, or you might not want to. Yeah. You know, you might enjoy the process of shopping and actually do something really worthwhile, un intentional with those gifts.

[00:08:40] And so we're not saying don't have one, but we're just saying. If you do have one, make sure that you are shopping intentionally and you need to be super organised to make sure you execute on these gifts, don't you? 

[00:08:52] Ingrid: Yes, I think so. Lesley as well. So let's take a break and then after the break let's talk about if you do want to have gifts covered, how can you get yourself organised and what is important to think about?

[00:09:04] Hi everyone. Welcome back to your Gift Cupboard organising podcast. And before the break we kind of talked about why. We don't really like gift cupboards, but some people do need to have one or really want one. So let's not talk then about things you need to take into, into consideration if you want to organise your gifts cupboard, Lesley?

[00:09:27] Yeah, I think it's 

[00:09:27] Lesley: important, Ingrid, for us to make clear that this is more for a year round. Stock of things for birthdays and special occasions as opposed to a specific event. So obviously a gift cupboard for Christmas or Thanksgiving or Hanukkah or something else where you give gifts is going to be very different.

[00:09:44] That's kind of a separate thing. Of course, you want to buy gifts in advance of a special occasion like that. We're talking much more about those things that you kind of pick up and think that's going to come in for some someone's birthday. And it very much depends as welling grid on how you give gifts.

[00:09:59] Some people are much better gift givers than others and give them more prolifically. Now, we already said before the break that you know you are, you, you've consider yourself not to be a great gift giver, but if you do give gifts, you are giving more consumable gifts rather typically Yeah. Rather than things that you're not quite sure about.

[00:10:16] And so, Some people do do that and some people, some people are really good gift givers and, and how lovely is it to get a nice gift that you weren't expecting? That's not for a birthday and stuff, so, so yeah, it very much depends on who you are and how you give gifts. 

[00:10:31] Ingrid: Yes. Lesley, I think you're absolutely right.

[00:10:33] Some people absolutely nail the gift giving, don't they? I mean, the present itself is amazing. They have got all these kind of quirky. Places where they pick things up and it's really, sometimes it's bespoke or it's handmade, or they've thought about giving a present well in advance so they've had time to personalize it.

[00:10:54] I mean, it's like, wow, I'm an organised person, but it's just not in my, my psyche to, to do all of that. And other people are really, really good at it. And then they go all out with the gift wrap and all of those things. And it's like absolutely fantastic, but it's probably something that they really enjoy themselves as well to do and to to look for and to find something that's special.

[00:11:20] And they probably don't want to kind of go, okay, lemme just quickly go on Amazon and order something in that we can have delivered tonight. I think they really enjoyed the whole process of sourcing. 

[00:11:30] Lesley: Yeah, I think I'm much more of a last minute person. I mean, not really. Not really, really, really last minute.

[00:11:35] I eat late, but I think I am more like a week before or two weeks before or a few days before, rather than planning things in advance. Some people are really good at that, aren't they? Planning things in advance, and I think I. That's what this is all about. So what we're going to talk about now is I think we're going to talk a little bit about how you would execute on a gift cupboard.

[00:11:53] And what we mean by that is if you have got this supply of, uh, lovely gifts that you've amassed over the years, which again, even though Ingrid and I have now got one, that doesn't mean to say that other people shouldn't have them. How do you make sure that you use that optimally? I think that's what this is all about, Ingrid.

[00:12:07] So what sort of suggestions have we got so that this doesn't just keep on having gifts put into it and no gifts coming out of it. We need to make sure that we are. There's a, there's a throughput of gifts, don't we, from your gift 

[00:12:20] Ingrid: cup or gift box? Yeah. Well, first of all, Lesley, I think it's really important to assign a designated space.

[00:12:27] I think that's where it starts. You need to find a cupboard somewhere, a shelf somewhere. It doesn't necessarily have to be in your living room. It can be in a spare bedroom somewhere. It. What's I think, critical for a gift cupboard is that it's actually has easy access. So when you pick up something that you think, oh, that will be a nice gift for my, one of my friends who's going to have a birthday later this year.

[00:12:54] It needs to be e, easily be able to put it away once you've bought it. And also the gift cupboard needs to have space to hold items that you buy. So if a cup gift cupboard is absolutely choke a block and you try to squeeze something in, it's going to again get damaged. So then on top of that, I think it needs to be somewhere that you easily can get stuff out.

[00:13:18] So don't have it behind something or under something or tucked away somewhere, because as soon as there's a barrier, In that room or in that area for the item to come out. You don't, you, you just don't do, do it as easily, and I think that's when you don't have to put through of the, the items in the cupboards.

[00:13:39] Now, secondly, I think what's also important is if you have a gift cupboard, you need to review the items in it maybe once a year and kind of go, okay. You kind of buy stuff along the way. You get stuff out along the way, but I think once a year you need to go. Right. Let me do a little bit of a look through.

[00:14:01] Get everything out. What have I got left? What have I forgotten that I bought that I had? Because sometimes we buy a pickup. A couple of things with not a specific person in mind, but we know it's a good gift. Then we forget we've bought it. So have a look through that once a year and go, Ooh, ooh. That moment's actually passed that children's book that I bought in the past that I thought would come in handy one day, actually, I don't have any kids now from that age that that book would be suitable for.

[00:14:30] So I need to now take it out and possibly just randomly give it away or donate it or bring it to a school or whatever it is, a local library, and kind of clear out your gift cupboard and to stay on top of that. 

[00:14:44] Lesley: Yeah, no, I think that's really important. And you know, I was thinking to myself as well when you were talking about the place for your gift cupboard, actually you need to have one.

[00:14:51] So that's, that's rule number one, isn't it? So yeah, it needs to be all those things, but you need to have one and so you need to have some kind of box, don't you, somewhere. So a lot of people have got 'em scattered and then you need to find the space for them. Uh, would you go lid on or lid off, off this box?

[00:15:05] Ingrid? Well, 

[00:15:05] Ingrid: Lesley, I think. If it is a cupboard without, which has shells, I would put a box in without a lid. I would not put an extra barrier of a lid because then you can just pull the box out, have a little look in and say, okay, what have I got in here? Instead of them trying to kind of wriggle the box out, take the lid off and give yourself an extra a step in the process.

[00:15:27] I 

[00:15:27] Lesley: think it, you know, the, the point that you made about going through the box on a regular occasion to see what you've got and doing a kind of inventory is really important. And, and actually I would take it one step further and go through that box and assign it to people throughout the year. So you might want to do every month, every couple of months or something, go through and go, okay.

[00:15:46] Here's my box. This is what I've got. What birthdays or special occasions have I got coming up that I can assign those gifts to specific people? And you need to make sure that you are do so that's a proactive process. So you're going through, you're thinking, right, what's coming up? What can I do? How can I plan?

[00:16:01] And then you need to put it somewhere. You know, record that information somewhere, either, um, in a calendar if you've got someone's birthday in a calendar or on a piece of paper or so in a notebook, whatever. However you record your kind of to-do list and make sure that's recorded and make sure when it gets to that time that you're actually going to do something with it.

[00:16:22] Ingrid: Yeah, I think you're completely right. I mean, um, you can even, you know, kind of go okay, in the, in the third week of the previous month. What next month have I cut coming up? So if you're really short on time to go out shopping and do these things, go, what have I cut coming up? Have I got the right gift, the right card, the right wrapping, and all of those things?

[00:16:43] And do I need to shop for anything to make sure that this actually leaves? Have I got, if I want to send it by post, have I got the right envelopes? When am I going to go to the post office? How long? If it needs to be sent across the world, it's still going to take a little while. You know you can't have something delivered tomorrow.

[00:17:00] You need more time for that. Yeah, absolutely. 

[00:17:03] Lesley: Now, uh, so we're talking about the location of this, um, gift box. So do you think it needs to be next to your other gift? Things like wrapping paper, gift bags? Do you think it needs to be next to it, or can it be somewhere different? 

[00:17:15] Ingrid: Well, I think for, for just. If you have the space, I can definitely recommend if you've got a gift cupboard, that's where you also put your gift wrap and your gift bags and your name tags and maybe, I don't know, the, the, the, the nice paper that you can put in it and maybe even a books with the cards, because then you start to create a kind of a, A one-stop shop, don't you, where you've got everything together instead of having to hunt down in different places.

[00:17:44] I mean, you can even put your, your books with cards there. Other people might say, well, if my gift cupboard is upstairs, I'd rather have my cards downstairs. I think you need to look at your own house. What would work? But I think having it all together definitely makes sense to me. 

[00:18:00] Lesley: Yeah, I completely agree with that.

[00:18:02] It's all about the space that you've got. So, um, if I were to have a gift cupboard, which I don't. I don't think it would be with my gif wrapping, 'cause my space wouldn't really allow that. And so I think it's, you know, I've got some space in a utility room that I would kind of maybe put those kind of things.

[00:18:17] Um, not with my gif wrapping, but the thing is about gif wrapping cards, they tend to be, not many people have got designated spots for everything. So people tend to have them split up a little bit, don't they? Because you just put those kind of things in where you can fit them. Yeah. But it is important to, to also have your gift wrapping and everything ready to go as well as the gifts, isn't it?

[00:18:37] Ingrid: Yeah, I think so. I mean, how, how handy would it be to have your wrapping paper, a name tag, your cell tape, uh, some scissors all in one place, and then also it's much easier to put it all back once you finish wrapping something instead of then having to go to different places again in your house to return all these items, because that's when items get lost because, You.

[00:19:01] You do a job, you run out, you don't tie the stuff away properly and that's how things get lost. Or people have to buy stuff over and over again because especially scissors just kind of seem to disappear somewhere. 

[00:19:14] Lesley: Yeah. You know, I think what you talked about cards there and we've talked about a gift cover, but actually a lot of people do the same thing when it comes to cards as well.

[00:19:21] And you pick up cards as you see them and think. That'll come in. That'll come in for a female's birthday or that will come in for a child's seventh birthday or whatever. So people are mass cards, don't they? In the same way as they do gifts when they see a card, think that's going to come in. And again, you need to really keep a close eye on the inventory of your cards in the same way that you do presents, 

[00:19:40] Ingrid: don't you?

[00:19:41] Yes, absolutely. I mean, what can really help, I think, is if you are a big card collector, have them all together in a box and kind of subcategorize them a little bit. So, If you then need it, you don't have to rummage through lots of cards to find the one, but see if you can sub-categorize, deliver it into children and adults or special occasions to make it easy for yourself, be and to use up all the lovely items.

[00:20:06] I mean, you've thought about when you've picked out a gift or picked out a card and you think, oh, that's perfect for this person. You, you want to use that because you've put thought and attention into that. So it would be such a waste to then not be able to find the gift or the card, and then you have to start from scratch again.

[00:20:26] So use all this stuff up and whittle the amounts down a little bit while you're at it. So it. Gets easier for you to maintain all these items. 

[00:20:37] Lesley: Now, you've talked a little bit about categorizing, and that makes me a little bit nervous, if I'm honest with you, Ingrid. 'cause that really suggests that there's high volumes.

[00:20:46] Mm-hmm. So when you're talking about categorizing cards, talking about categorizing your gift box, That means that there's going to be a lot of stuff in it if it, if it requires categorization. Mm-hmm. That's high volumes. And so what kind of volumes do you think is an appropriate amount to have in your cards or in your gift cardboard?

[00:21:03] I'm putting you on the spot here. I 

[00:21:04] Ingrid: know, I know. I mean, I would definitely say, Run all of these supplies down. You have so much wrapping, so many carts, so many gifts. It all needs to be maintained and taken care of and sorted and resorted. So the more stuff you have, the more time it's going to cost you to keep track of it all.

[00:21:26] And I think people buy these things because they think, oh, that will save me money and save me time, and I've got everything here. But it also means that you have to keep an eye on that, on these items while they're at your house. And if you are a person who's got a lot of clutter, it beco can become a lot of work to keep track.

[00:21:44] So I, I would say have as little as possible. I. Agreed, 

[00:21:49] Lesley: and I think there needs to be that rotation. So none of these things should really be there for any longer than a year, should they? Yeah. You should never really have any more gifts or cards or wrapping. I know it's not always as simple as that, but you should only really, you should.

[00:22:01] There should be that throughput in the course of a year, shouldn't they? Otherwise, it's too 

[00:22:04] Ingrid: much, I think as well, Lesley, I. Styles change people's hobbies and things change. People's life change what sounded as a good idea at the time. So much can happen and you might think, oh, that you thought you, you had a fantastic, uh, gift.

[00:22:23] But then when it comes to it, because you've bought it eight months ago and by the time that their birthday comes around, you might think, well, it was a good thing at the time. But now they've, they've changed their interests or then their hobby or. I saw something else that would've been far more suitable.

[00:22:40] People also try now be more mindful about what type of gifts they give. You know, they try, you know, they might give gift food or perishables or whatever. People's life changed along the way. Yeah, 

[00:22:54] Lesley: exactly. So I think really in a nutshell, We're not averse to a gift cupboard, but you need to be realistic about whether or not you can manage that.

[00:23:02] You need to be quite an organised, meticulous person to make sure that the stuff that you are buying and keeping is stuff that is going to be used. You need to shop still very intentionally within your gift cupboard, either for age appropriate gifts, if it's for children. Or to have somebody in mind if it's an adult gift.

[00:23:21] Um, and you need to make sure that you, there's this constant throughput and that you are doing this inventory, uh, on a regular basis. 

[00:23:28] Ingrid: Yeah, I, I think that's absolutely fantastically summarized. Lesley, I think we've covered everything that we wanted to cover in this podcast. So listeners, how do you feel about your gift covered?

[00:23:41] Have you got one? Do you now think, actually, I don't have one, but I want one. Ooh. Or maybe you're like, yes, I have one and I've got far too much stuff in with Lesley, and your words have resonated with me and I'm going to have to do a clear out. Let us know in the comments in your podcast player here on the website, you can leave a comment for us or email us and let us know what are you going to do about it.

[00:24:07] We would love to know. So thanks so much for listening next week. It's going to be a nice one because we are going to flip the tables because Lesley is going to be interviewed by Tom Watson, our recent guest here on the podcast, so can't wait to hear that. So thanks for being here, and we're going to see you soon.
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