As appeared in Times Now .
Diwali - that time of the year when corporates extend gifts to employees and clients as a sign of appreciation of their contribution. With staying healthy taking precedence this year more than ever, corporates are creating Covid-19 centric gift packages, filled with immunity-boosting products.
Immunity boosting teas, ayurvedic products, honey, Vitamin C supplements are all making it to the Diwali corporate gifting list. Although sweets are not off the table, only branded and packaged sweets are now preferred. Corporates are also cutting out oily snacks from their gifts.
Arvind Mediratta, MD & CEO of Metro Cash & Carry said, "There is a shift towards snacking but healthier snacks. People are gifting a lot of dry fruits, almonds, pistachios. This is different from the typical gifting of namkeens that we would see in the past. So people are choosing healthier snacking options. There is also demand for juices which are considered healthier in comparison to aerated drinks which used to be preferred earlier."
Another interesting trend is the shift towards gifts that help in making life and work from home easier, like - home decor and digital entertainment products. According to pre-paid gift card service provider Qwikcilver, a subsidiary of Pine Labs, gift cards of newer categories like insurance, digital entertainment, self-learning & health & wellness are seeing many takers.
"Now there is a lot of preference for anything to do with digital content, OTT gift cards are in demand. There are corporates which have created packages that are Covid-19 centric to enable people to work from home, anything to do with health, insurance," said Kumar Sudarsan, President of Gift and Prepaid Stored Value at Pine Labs.
Owing to Covid-19, corporates are also increasingly choosing contactless gifting. According to Qwikcilver, there has been a 30 per cent increase in consumption of gift cards of both offline & online brands as compared to Pre-COVID levels.
With the economic slowdown hitting companies hard, mid and small corporates are opting for economical options. According to Metro Cash & Carry, earlier the budget of companies has reduced to just Rs 500 per employee from anywhere between Rs 1,000 to Rs 10,000 earlier.
"Many companies have in fact decided to do away with gifting completely. Both with employees as well as business partners. This would be 25per cent to 30 per cent of the corporate sector," says Mediratta.
Safety, health and spending wisely are the top priorities for corporates. With these new trends in gifting, Diwali celebrations continue in these difficult times.