I'm not a religious person but I LOVE Christmas. Actually I love birthdays and any other excuse to give people gifts. I'm not great at shopping for myself, I'm fairly fussy/specific in my taste to start with and having been a student for so many years on and off I got very good at distinguishing between need and want. So much so that these days even when I find something I like my brain kicks in with "yeah it's nice but do you really NEED it? How often are you really going to use it?" and my favourite one of all is comparing the price to my grocery bill "that's 3 weeks worth of groceries, that's a fair chunk of budget." All of this is terribly responsible but it does mean I rarely indulge in blatant consumerism.
This is where buying gifts for others comes in. Some people resent the "obligation" (see Sheldon's rant on gift giving in "The Bath Item Gift Hypothesis" episode of The Big Bang Theory)
Actually it's awesome so I'm just gonna post the transcript riiiight here...
Sheldon: Oh, Penny. I know you think you’re being generous, but the foundation of gift-giving is reciprocity. You haven’t given me a gift, you’ve given me an obligation.
Howard: Don’t feel bad, Penny, it’s a classic rookie mistake. My first Hanukkah with Sheldon, he yelled at me for eight nights.
Penny: Now, honey, it’s okay.You don’t have to get me anything in return.
Sheldon: Of course I do. The essence of the custom is that I now have to go out and purchase for you a gift of commensurate value and representing the same perceived level of friendship as that represented by the gift you’ve given me. It’s no wonder suicide rates skyrocket this time of year.
Ok I'm done. Anywho I get more fun out of buying gifts for other people because I can't make the same excuses for other people as I can for myself so I can buy them awesome things that they may not need because hey, it's a gift!
One of my best girlfriends recently expressed the desire to find some nice artwork for her house so with this in mind I set about finding something for her, with Christmas as the excuse.
I'm a big fan of etsy so I started there and came across an artist named Liz Kapiloto.
You can find her etsy shop here - http://etsy.me/zdGhjY
She does beautiful work and exactly the right style for my friend so I picked (with great difficulty) one of the pictures and placed my order. I was super organised as it was the first week of December and shipping was estimated at 6-10 working days. Plenty of time. Even better I got a message from Liz the same day letting me know that my order was posted and on its way.
I went looking for a nice frame for the piece and then dutifully awaited my package.
I did all of my Christmas shopping online this year, having spent way too many years doing Christmas in retail I was not going anywhere near a shop, so I had numerous packages arriving during December. Sadly though my artwork purchase was not among them.
I emailed Liz and let her know that my package hadn't arrived and she organised for a replacement immediately (random trivia - the post office is open on Sundays in Israel, awesome right?!). Of course this meant that despite being over 3 weeks late, the original package turned up, followed closely by the replacement. Liz had insisted on sending the replacement free of charge and despite trying to reimburse her seeing as though I now had both, she refused to allow me to pay for the second one. Now THAT ladies and gentlemen is customer service!
I am now scoping out Liz's store for future purchases, having already gifted another print to my flatmate for her birthday. Her approach to custom service, even in a setting like etsy, has made me a devoted fan. Retail stores should really take note. For my part at least I shop online not for a better price but for convenience and believe it or not customer service. Go figure.
Oh and just I case you were wondering here's one of the framed prints. Sooo purdy!
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