Economy & LaborJAN 11, 2024

40 Of The Most Disappointing And Outright Cruel Gifts People Received At Work

Mantas Kačerauskas and Robertas Lisickis

Corporate gifts have become a bit of a standard among many companies in terms of employee motivation. Whether it’s a personalized birthday gift or a gift given to everyone over the holidays, it’s definitely a great way to show the employees that their hard work and loyalty to the company have not been ignored.

Unless you’re like these folk on Reddit who themselves, or their friends and family, had to endure getting gifts that leave much—much—to be desired. It does beg the question of whether getting nothing would’ve been a better choice.

#1

40 Of The Most Disappointing And Outright Cruel Gifts People Received At Work

My mom’s boss gave everyone a pen (a really cr*ppy, normal pen) with their names printed on normal white printer paper that was scotch taped down the side of the pen. This sounds made up even to me as I type it, but it’s still in our junk drawer.

Normal_Regular9359, Liviu C. / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

108points

#2

Not me, but one year the company my brother works for gave each employee a CD of the owner playing Christmas songs on the harmonica.

Slight-Attempt1444, Chris Yates / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

104points

#3

A small, nickel-sized, heart-shaped rock sent in the mail. It was supposed to represent their appreciation for the extra work during Covid. All I could think of was Charlie Brown trick or treating, “I got a rock.”

Seven_bushes, Anna Urlapova / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

102points

It goes without saying that corporate gifts are a good idea, if done right. It was reported that 42% of businesses claim relationship management is their top reason for why they’re gifting things.

Corporate gifts are considered a pretty effective tool for humanizing the company and thus strengthening coworker relationships.

#4

That year the company decided it wasn’t going to provide basic office supplies for the break room. Coffee, tea, eating utensils, napkins, nothing. That year for Christmas we all got a brown paper bags fashioned like lunches. Inside was a metal straw, cloth napkin, a child sized set of plastic cutlery that fit in a travel case, a copy paste printed piece of paper with food puns in relation to our job, and a single fun sized hundred grand candy bar. This Fortune 500 company had over a billion in raw profit that year. Oh, and the cutlery ended up getting recalled due to some terrible forever chemicals in them.

Hobo_Knife, Dmitry Mashkin / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

93points

#5

A letter from the CEO telling us how he is going to celebrate Christmas with his family up north to go skiing. That was all.

eatingaclitkat, Omar Lopez / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

89points

#6

Two free tickets to a cinema. The issue was that the closest cinema in that particular chain was about 800 miles away from me.

ATHYRIO, cottonbro studio / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

88points

Besides that, corporate gifts are a meaningful way to express appreciation for the hard work employees do. Not only are the employees happy to be appreciated, the company can benefit from it too with increased business growth.

And it’s not just employees—corporate gifts work just as well with business partners and inter-company relationships too.

#7

An email that only upper management would be getting the end of year bonus (sent to entire company by accident instead of just upper management). Then laid off 2 weeks into the new year.

Found out from a friend in the company a little while later that the board of directors held a vote. They keep their car allowances at the expense of a wave of layoffs, or lose their car allowances and 10-15 people get to keep their jobs. Pretty sure it was unanimous.

No matter how many times a company says you’re family, just remember that it’s the type of family that would gladly cut your throat to make sure the fat cats get to eat.

strike-when-ready

Report

88points

#8

Jelly of the Month membership instead of my Christmas bonus. I wanted to put a pool in the backyard but nope.

inkyblinkypinkysue

Report

82points

#9

Noise-cancelling Bluetooth headphones. I'm sure they were good and useful to some people, but I'm legally deaf.

TacticalGoatse, Tomasz Gawłowski / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

80points

Other reasons to use corporate gifts include providing an opportunity to stand out as a company, overcome physical distance barriers (especially in light of remote work and the pandemic), and it allows everyone to focus more on the positive. That last one in turn can foster a more effective relationship if trouble arises.

#10

I worked at a hospital in the billing department. I got a travel thingy of hand sanitizer. Meanwhile, the IT department who shared our building got North Face puffy jackets. Jokes on them though, it was Christmas 2019 and I had hand sanitizer for COVID. 😭

ArtificialStrawberry, Tai's Captures / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

80points

#11

We were told we were receiving our Christmas bonuses soon, and then we were all given a poinsettia. The poinsettia in itself wasn’t so bad, mine is actually still alive years later, but the fact that they had the audacity to call it a bonus was absurd.

needsexyboots, Aka / Wikipedia (not the actual photo)

Report

78points

#12

I was gifted a ham for the holidays…..I’m Jewish.

FXSB13, Сергей Орловский / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

73points

So, what’s the best strategy at approaching corporate gifts? Assuming a budget is set and the logistics are all figured out, all that’s really left is to pick out a gift, to make it personal, and then to put the plan into motion.

In terms of what to pick, the short answer is it depends. On what? You have to pick out a gift that your employees will actually like.

#13

Nurses Week 2022 (height of Delta wave COVID). We were given rocks on a keychain. The rock was engraved with the word “Hope”. We might have gotten some chapstick too.

rad_rabbitt

Report

68points

#14

Not me but a friend - all staff at the hospital received a kitchen scrubby for Christmas. Not even themed. Just random browns, greens, pinks, and yellows... seems like the boss bought dollar store multi-packs and opened them to give everyone one piece.

smeowth, Artem Makarov / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

67points

#15

New owners this year. Old owner gave us 10% of our salary as a year end bonus. New guys gave us $100 amazon cards that were drained by the time we got them. Everyone was pissed but didn't wanna say anything so I did. He asked everyone and they claimed to be delighted with their cards. Spineless bastards. Lmao.

dankasaurus710

Report

66points

The general rule is to find gifts that would be both personalized and practical. One of the more popular approaches is choice-based gifting, which commonly takes shape in the form of gift cards.

Alternatively, you can compile a curated collection for employees to choose from.

#16

An ultra-religious self-help book so we could become less miserable, incompetent and immoral.

HappyListerFiend, Olia Gozha / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

65points

#17

Teacher here.

One year, as our Christmas bonus, we got a defective plastic keychain that read "I love teching!" Spelled exactly like that.

Normally, I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.. but after the s**t we had been through, with zero support from admin, s**t pay, disrespect, etc. the keychain set us all off. It was adding insult to injury.

Like, not only is our "bonus" a keychain that didn't even work (the hasp had no spring), but the spelling error meant that a) someone didn't even check them when they arrived, and b) someone put them in every teacher mailbox without looking at them.

Admin sent out an email that basically said turn your keychains back in so they could send them back and get corrected ones. So, adding insult to injury.

I appreciated the sentiment, but all of us could've done without that.

DecisionThot, Manikandan Annamalai / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

65points

#18

Company coffee mug with the company name misspelled. It was a large company.

Klotzster, Nathan Dumlao / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

64points

A bonus on top of all this gifting would be to make sure that sustainability is taken into account. So, organic and eco-friendly materials is the way to go. Well, that, and also if you do end up getting something that one person absolutely hates and will likely get rid of it, at least the carbon footprint is minimized. But let’s hope that’s not the case.

#19

During the pandemic, my partner’s company sent employees each an envelope through the mail with a sticker in it for some appreciation week I laughed so hard at that. It literally was a sticker that said “happy appreciation week”.

universalrefuse, erica steeves / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

62points

#20

I was re-gifted a gift basket given to my boss by a client and he forgot to remove the card that was addressed to him.

ihatetwizzlers, Freddie Collins / unsplash (not the actual photo)

Report

59points