Basket customize food gift gourmet

How can the independent gift basket packer survive?

Author Kahlil Gibrahn wrote, "Work is love made visible." This is a wonderful description for the work gift basket professionals perform when we take specialty foods and other gift items and arrange them with loving care into finished gift-giving designs. When I see the delight and surprise in the eyes of a gift basket recipient, I am rewarded for the labor of love made visible. I genuinely enjoy my work in the gift basket business and I push on despite increasing obstacles and pressures to financial success.

I recently read that gift basket professionals who specialize in customized gifts will work hard to earn $200,000 a year to make a $40,000 salary, or 20 percent. If the average gift basket were $50, a gift basket professional would have to make more than 4,000 gift baskets a year to achieve that goal.

Perhaps that doesn't seem like a lot of gifts, but from this one-- woman shop it is. Specialty food manufacturers are designing more sophisticated gift arrangements for discount and membership stores as well as the general public through well-financed catalogs and Internet sites. Department stores and grocery stores are also expanding their gift basket offerings. Just before Christmas, one large grocery chain was advertising customized gift baskets around the clock. The convenience of the grocery store and the availability of stock items as well as specialty food offerings will continue to affect the independent gift basket professional. In addition, there is increasing competition from the florist industry, bath and body chains, crafters and everyone else who dabbles in gift baskets.

Lack of capital is a problem when trying to compete with companies with far more resources. And, since many gift basket companies begin on a shoestring budget, cash flow is often a concern-especially when 30 to 50 percent of our sales come in the fourth quarter. Creating a recognizable and desirable brand of gift basket, sought after by customers far and wide, is also an issue for the customizing gift basket professional. Finding unique containers and gift items available only to the gift basket industry at the right price point is increasingly difficult to find. Moreover, gift basket professionals who cannot purchase wholesale items at discount prices are finding it increasingly difficult to compete on price with packers who buy in larger quantities and sell to large discount chains for less.

A sluggish economy doesn't help either. Gift baskets are often the first thing to go when businesses and people have to tighten their belts.

So, how do we, who customize gifts, carry on? Having a marketing plan and sticking to it is the first line of defense in this difficult market. Emphasizing service, delivery and personalization; quality of products and unique designs will help distinguish our products from the mass-- marketed ones.

Learning all we can on how to conduct business and secure financing is key to survival. We need to help customers focus more on the positive benefits of giving and less on its cost.

We need to make ordering a gift easy and stress free. Finally, we need to diversify our product offerings and recognize that people want to go where their needs will be most efficiently met.

ELISSA GOLDBERGBELLE, OWNER, IT'S A WRAP!

SPRINGFIELD, ILL.

WRAPTHIS@EOSINC.COM