I love gifting, so the holiday season is often my excuse to find creative (and sometimes totally absurd) ways to tell the humans in my life how much they mean to me. This year was extra heavy, so I knew I wanted to do something a little extra special to spread some much-needed joy to some very dear friends of mine.
What I didn’t know was how much joy I would receive in the process of bringing this silly little idea to fruition.
The idea started out pretty simple — create curated gift boxes with products from local PDX businesses for 12 of my friends.
Wanting to support small, local businesses, I did some research and decided to intentionally purchase all my gifts from Built Oregon and the Portland Bazaar.
Built Oregon is a non-profit collective of volunteer business mentors serving Oregon’s Maker culture to create an equitable & sustainable future for all Oregonians. Their website allows you to shop across a wide variety of local vendors and place a single order, making shopping simple and stress-free. I really enjoyed shopping some of their curated marketplaces, especially My People’s Market, which is a marketplace re-imagined as a gathering of Portland’s diverse and vibrant entrepreneurs, makers, artists, culinary wizards, and beverage crafters.
The Portland Bazaar (which is typically an in-person weekend event) went online this year, in response to the pandemic. Orders placed through their website support not only their own small business, but also the 80+ Portland based makers/artists/designers that the bazaar features. Much like Built Oregon, The Portland Bazaar site allows you to shop across a variety of local businesses. You can have your items shipped to you, but they also offer an option to pick up orders in-person every Saturday between 11am and 2pm. I opted for the pick-up option to reduce the carbon emissions, packaging, energy, and extra cost of shipping, but also for a chance to meet the humans behind such a compassionate effort.
I danced merrily to festive holiday jams as I dropped chocolate bars, chutneys and chile oils into my virtual shopping carts.
All of my Built Oregon orders arrived within 2–3 days and I took a bus across the river to pick up my orders from the Portland Bazaar during their in-person pick-up window. I gave them my order numbers, to which they replied,
“Are you Sparks? We’ve been waiting for you.”
I guess that’s what I get for placing 3 separate orders in 2 days, but what can I say? The idea was growing and with it, my scope and gift list! As they handed me the large box of products I had ordered, I quickly realized how unaware I was of the the size of the 11 additional, unfolded boxes I had ordered to help deliver the curated selections to each of my friends. Let’s just say I had to call a Lyft to get everything back to my apartment.
I was eager to put the boxes together and see the final product of my idea, but as I folded my first box and placed the first selection of products inside, I realized just how big these boxes were…
I knew I couldn’t gift them like this — they looked silly. I thought about finding smaller boxes to use, or ordering more products to fill out the boxes, or taking a bus back to the Bazaar to swap them for the smaller size, but ultimately retreated to what I do best — experiment.
As I was searching for wrapping supplies in my fairly minimalist 600 square-foot apartment, I came across a small stack of newspaper I was using to build a paper mache space helmet a few weeks prior. At first I just crumbled up the paper to use as a padding underneath the products to give the illusion of a fuller box, but I wanted everything in the box to be intentional and purposeful.
That’s when I got the idea to turn this box into a total immersive xmas* experience.
I decided I would create a digital companion piece to the physical gift box. I created clues within the pages of the newspaper used to pack each box that would, when solved, lead the recipient to a website that would continue their gift experience.
I spent hours and hours circling letters in newspapers, and my apartment soon began to look like that of a manic detective trying to solve a murder mystery.
The last step was to write a card that led the recipient to the site, while also hinting at how they should approach solving the riddle. As I later learned, this hint didn’t quite get through to everyone.
My living room was turning into Santa’s workshop:
Add the final product looked something like this:
When folks solved the riddle, they would have the URL and password needed to enter the site. Care to try your luck at cracking the code? (Pro tip: Use the card above as your guide.)
Next was the digital component.
I created a hidden password-protected page on my portfolio site that tied the whole experience together, providing additional details to the reasoning behind the gift, links to the makers and their products, and a list of ways to spread the cheer.
I wanted this companion site to do two things:
- Make people feel loved, and
- Inspire them to spread that love with others.
I kicked things off with a quirky intro and an even quirkier video, which may or may not have included a new rendition of the 12 days of christmas written by yours truly.
Then I introduced the real MVPs — the local business owners themselves. I was grateful to be able to support 16 local businesses, 13 of which are womxn-owned, and 7 of which are POC-owned.
For this section, I originally added a grid of business logos instead of the photos you see below, thinking that would make it easier for recipients to recognize the 4–5 brands showcased in their box. But I wanted to shift the focus to the amazing humans behind each of the businesses, rather than the products they sold. This turned out to be one of the most rewarding parts of the process for me. Reading about how each of these business owners got their start, how they hustled and persisted, and how much joy it brings them to do what they love and share that with others — that was everything.
My hope was that by taking the extra time to add photos, names, links, and tags to each of the 16 businesses supported, viewers might be more encouraged to not only find the 4–5 makers responsible for their gifts, but explore all the others as well!
I signed off with a call to action. I wanted to make it as easy (and fun!) as possible for folks to spread the love, so I compiled a quick list of ways they could continue to support these awesome business owners throughout the holiday season, and beyond!
Now the fun part: playing santa.
I borrowed a sleigh (my friend’s car), loaded up my gifts, and set out on a day full of stealthy ninja gift-giving. I traveled all across the city, dropping boxes on doorsteps and running back to my sleigh so as to be unseen and keep the magic of the experience alive.
I had 12 boxes to deliver, so the route took a large portion of the day, but it soon become more than worth it as my phone began to explode with texts of excitement, gratitude, and joy. People were starting to find and open their boxes, read their cards, and embark on cracking the code to the rest of their gift. And for a few moments (or hours, or days, for some of them) it seemed like maybe these boxes really did help capture and spread the xmas* cheer we all so desperately needed.
When I snuck my last box into my friend’s car (yes, the one I had been using as a sleigh all day) and started out on my walk home, I finally got the chance to read through all the texts, photos, and videos I had been receiving all day. I had people sharing their thought-processes as they tried to crack the code, their appreciation for the gift, and their surprise and delight when they finally got to the site. One of my friend’s even live recorded herself trying to crack the code on Marco Polo and it was honestly one of the best things I’ve ever seen.
It was hard not to get emotional. I was so fascinated to hear about how each person approached the unboxing and experience of solving the riddle. From those who spent hours counting words and letters on product labels to those who had to go grab their newspaper out of the garbage to those who had to phone a friend, it was unbelievably entertaining and so very rewarding to witness.
And, because you can’t take the researcher out of the santa (lol), I did ask each recipient to rate their perceived level of difficulty to crack the code on a scale from 1–10 (with 10 being extremely difficult). The results were all over the place, but the average was a solid 6. Here’s one of my faves, from a recipient who approached the riddle by exploring word associations and counting the letters on the products in their box:
“Well, it was 10 (extremely difficult) until I pulled out the paper, then it was 1 (extremely fun).”
So what did I learn from this silly little xmas* idea?
- Though it may take a bit more effort, it’s much easier on the heart to shop small, and shop local.
- When something doesn’t go as planned, pivot. Turn it into a creative challenge and see where your imagination takes you.
- Shifting your focus from shopping products to supporting the humans behind the products can completely change your perspective.
- Everyone interprets and solves problems in their own way. Embrace the spectrum, and be ready to adapt.
- Cats really like boxes, and newspaper.
Shop Local. Gift experiences. Spread joy.
Support small, local Portland businesses by shopping at the Portland Bazaar (last pick-up window before Christmas is Wednesday, 12/23!) or Built Oregon, especially their My People’s Market.
If you enjoyed this post, show it some love by giving it some 👏 or sharing it with a friend! And please feel free to share any other tips/resources for shopping small and local this holiday season in the comments below. I would love to hear them!
xoxo - s/sarah/sb/sparks/brokaw/bkaw/red, etc. ❤️🎄🎊
