How do you celebrate employee birthdays?

[lilithd]

I'm in charge of whipping up something original and personal for each employee's birthday throughout the year. The problem is, I'm only budgeted for $7/person. What on earth can I do with that? Any suggestions would be mighty appreciated at this point.
TIA
Marjorie

[ozbound]

It's amazing what you can do with little money--I have some experience since I'm always on a tight budget!   Discount stores (such as Big Lots), even Dollar Stores, offer some nice gift items for under $10.  So does Costco. You can also put together little "baskets"--for example, a mug with some tea or fancy cocoas, a small basket of bath supplies, a candy dish with some M&M's, etc.
Hope you find this helpful--have fun!

Edited by ozbound on 04/01/02 05:34 PM.

[donnap99]

That is a tight budget!  Not sure about gift ideas, but I can tell you something that's virtually free that I used to do:  I made the birthday cards -- very personalized -- and then of course had everyone in the department sign it.  This was years and years ago when clip art was hard to come by, and the card was printed on plain paper & folded.  After a while the card became the big thing people wanted go to the birthday "party" for.  One particularly personal one I remember went something like this - it was for our computer geek.  She still had it on her board a few years later when I left.  

IF DATE = 010302
THEN DATE = LINDA'S BIRTHDAY
AND LINDA'S BIRTHDAY = FUN
SELECT: COMPUTER DEPARTMENT EMPLOYEES
OUTPUT: PARTY

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LINDA!




DonnaP99

[ohiosec]

In my office co-workers bring in goodies for the birthday person.  It's almost like a personality contest because some people get an avalanche of goodies while some get a bare minimum.    

If you have to spend the $7 -- how about 7 instant lottery tickets?

[countrigal]

We're looking at starting a new tradition here.  What we're going to do is bring in boxes (one for each birthday person that month), label them and then set them in the break room.  Anyone and everyone can then add gifts, cards, etc that they want for any of the birthday folks, with a dollar limit of $5.00/item.  At the end of the month the birthday person gets all the goodies they accumulated over the month.  Since it's hard for us to take time away (everyone has different meetings so we can never all meet for any reason) this takes the place of any birthday bash or such.  One afternoon during the month we have some cake brought in for the birthday people of that month, and as many people as possible will stop by during lunch to wish them well, but most just drop by personally to each birthday person, wish them well, and grab a piece of cake sometime during the day.

CountriGal
Deskdemon Editorial Board Member

[dwreath]

My boss has a $10.00 budget and what we've started doing is a $10.00 gift certificate for a local mall.  We've also done movie passes in that past.  I'm not one for gift certificates, but the employees seem to love them.

Also, I have some birthday stamps and some old card stock that the company wants used up and I stamp the cards for each birthday and then the bosses all sign it.  Thats what we put the gift certificate in.

[ozbound]

Now, there's an idea. A $7 (or even $5) certificate to the local Starbuck's/coffee shop can buy a person a latte and even a scone to go with it! I sure wouldn't complain if that was my birthday present!

[lilithd]

What a bunch of wonderful ideas.  
ozbound, I must say I like your idea the best. It seems to me to be the most fair and personalized.
I have an account with American Greetings which I use for the birthday cards, and everyone loves them. It's my own personal account.
Again, thank you all for the great ideas! I better get cracking, I have one coming up next week.