In 2015, Jeffrey Galak was an assistant professor of marketing at the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh when a doctoral student offered an idea: Dr. Galak, the student suggested, should expand his research beyond his initial area of interest, which was the concept of sentimental value, to an adjacent subject, the psychology of gift-giving.
“His name was Julian Givi, which is the most perfect name for somebody studying gift-giving,” Dr. Galak said on a video call last month from his office at the university, where he is now an associate professor. “And then we started working on it. The two of us have written, I don’t know, like eight to 10 papers now, studying this from all different angles.” (Dr. Givi now is an associate professor of marketing at the John Chambers College of Business and Economics at West Virginia University.)
Despite their multilayered research, Dr. Galak said he has not become an expert on trends. “I have no idea what the hot gift of the year is,” he said. “I’m the person that’s going to tell you, ‘This is what conceptually makes for a good gift.’”
And with the holiday season looming, Dr. Galak’s rather simple suggestion may come in handy for anyone struggling with their list: “The No. 1 piece of advice that I give every single person is: ‘Ask the recipient what they want.’ It is so easy and so straightforward, and yet we don’t do it.”
Dr. Galak said that quirk of human nature is what inspired him earlier this year as a founder of GiftStar, a free mobile app that uses AI to provide gift-giving recommendations. (The app is based on an affiliate marketing model; its owners make money when purchases are made through its links.)
“Gift-giving is as old as human civilization,” Dr. Galak said. “And I don’t think it’s changed that much fundamentally. But the ways in which we give gifts and maybe some of the cultural associations have changed.”
Please (Don’t) Give
Anyone who has perused an online gift registry lately could tell you that. From Christmas wish lists populated with Gen Z-approved items like reusable sandwich bags and Glossier candles to wedding registries that include accounts to help couples raise cash to buy a home, the culture of gift-giving has been undergoing a radical shift. Givers are grappling with how, or if, to buy things for loved ones whose environmental concerns, allergies, minimalist leanings or design sense have made them comfortable with speaking out about the items they want, and don’t want, in their lives.
Ziad Ahmed, the 25-year-old Head of Next Gen at United Talent Agency in New York City, attributed the change to Gen Z’s propensity to question cultural norms, a tendency accelerated by the pandemic.
“A lot of people are much more willing to say, ‘Actually, this is who I want to be, and this is how I want to be treated, even if it’s an inconvenience to you’,” Mr. Ahmed said. “People have more latitude and more confidence to say, ‘Hey, actually, I don’t want that, and I’m not going to pretend that I do.’
“On top of that, it’s saying, ‘Is my obligation first to appease you and your feelings or to planet, to self or to community?’” he added. “It’s really interrogating whom our obligation is to first. I don’t know that everybody’s asking the same questions all the time, but more of these questions are being constantly asked, which is absolutely changing the way that people are choosing to give.”
What they are choosing to give is changing, too — to a point.
“There is a strong focus on purpose-driven gifts, authenticity, personalization and eco-conscious products,” said Luke Hodson, 35, the founder of Nerds Collective, a youth marketing agency in London that advises brands on how to engage with Gen Z.
“But, traditional status is still super important,” he added. “Premium branded goods hold just as much currency as they have with other generations. So it’s this kind of weird dichotomy where you want eco-consciousness, while simultaneously looking for objects or experiences that allow you to flex and to project your chosen identity.”
All of this, of course, has been amplified by social media, Mr. Hodson said, “because there’s going to be a kind of Instagram moment around that gift transaction on both sides that, if successful, will have some visibility online. It becomes a signal for what you stand for and what that person stands for.”
Increasingly, much of that signaling reflects trends resonant in pop culture, particularly those born with TikTok.
Dayna Isom Johnson, a trend expert at Etsy, said modern milestones such as Galentine’s Day (celebrating women’s friendships) and divorce parties have expanded the gift-giving calendar and, in some cases, have replaced more traditional giving occasions.
“What we’re seeing is this idea of the chosen family,” Ms. Johnson said. “And then it’s kind of marking milestones with that chosen family that are much more important than traditional kinds of celebrations. Self-care days, ‘Friendsgiving.’ It’s all these very TikTok-like trends.”
Make a Wish
She noted that on Etsy, one of this year’s biggest gift-giving trends is home décor items inspired by food. “We saw lots of art prints that had sardines on them or necklaces with bow-tie pasta, and that’s immediately stemming from ‘The Bear’ — everyone’s watching it,” Ms. Johnson said, referring to the Hulu Emmy-winning show about a young fine dining chef who returns home to Chicago to run his family’s sandwich shop. “We had prints that said, ‘Yes, chef!’ That really trickles down from pop culture and then into your everyday life. With social media on the rise, we can see a surge overnight.”
Etsy’s top-selling holiday gifts, right on trend, are personalized charcuterie boards. “They’re for someone who loves to entertain and wants a functional, beautiful, well-crafted item in their home,” Ms. Johnson said, adding that the personalization could be something as varied as the two cities where a couple grew up. “You get to show off to your guests when they come into your space. And they get to learn about you.”
Bryony Sheridan, the buying director at Abask, an online dealer of high-end housewares, said that an increased demand for games seemed to reflect a larger trend in giving: gifts from one person to a group.
“Not just classic family games like Monopoly and Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit,” Ms. Sheridan said. “We’ve seen a rise in games like mahjong. And that feeds into the appeal of collectability.”
Toys and games are also a big category at GiftList, a free wish list app that Jonathan Jaklitsch, the company’s chief executive, conceived during the pandemic “when a lot of people were stuck at home and couldn’t travel for the holidays,” he said.
“We kept getting asked, ‘What do you want?” Mr. Jaklitsch added. “And we thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if folks could create a wish list — not just on Amazon, where all ideas are confined to one site — and share it with family and friends, and folks could reserve items on the list without worrying about duplicates?”
Online wish lists that allow people to follow the straightforward advice recommended by Dr. Galak, the marketing professor, however, don’t appeal to everyone.
“For a wedding, I always go off-list,” Ms. Sheridan said, referring to registries. “I’m the obnoxious one who thinks I can do better than that. The most important thing about choosing a gift is that a lot of thought has gone into it.”
Crystal L. Bailey, the director of the Etiquette Institute of Washington, also urged recipients to value the effort behind a gift. “We’re maybe losing a bit of the tact that goes along with this,” she said in a phone interview last month from Geneva, where she was attending a weeklong course on “the art of the table” at a Swiss finishing school.
“No one has to give you a gift,” she continued. “They’re doing something very gracious. For us to so strongly dictate what we are receiving may be a bit much.
“Etiquette evolves with society and social norms, but there still needs to be tactfulness. Am I being a gracious recipient? That, to me, is key. It’s really tough to put these demands on people.”
Avoiding the tricky nuances associated with gift-giving may help explain why in many cultures around the world, cash is the preferred gift.
“Cash is pretty efficient,” said Ernest Gundling, the co-founder and a managing partner of Aperian, a company based in Raleigh, N.C., that counsels Fortune 500 companies about business practices around the world. “We would frown on that here in the U.S. because it would be seen as mercenary in some ways. But different cultures have different ideas about cash gifts. If you dress it up in an envelope with a nice ribbon on it and it’s part of your New Year’s custom, as it is in Japan, then you’re going with the flow.”
Mr. Ahmed, the next-gen strategist, suggested that gifts can pale in comparison with what he and members of his peer group really want.
“Often what Gen Z wants is not another product, it’s not another transaction — it’s another connection,” he said. “When people ask, ‘What can I get for you?’ it’s like, ‘Connect me to another person that you think I should know.’”
The post Remember When Presents Were a Surprise? Not Anymore. appeared first on New York Times.
