Bad Santa Gift Ideas: The Gifts Everyone Tries to Steal

The gifts that get stolen in Bad Santa are the ones anyone in the room could enjoy that night: good snacks, chocolate, a bottle with something to go with it, and anything that looks bigger than its limit. Here are the gifts people fight over at a $30, $40 and $50 limit, and the ones that sit on the table until everyone goes home.

If you want one that goes straight onto the gift table, our Secret Santa hampers arrive ready to give, with a free gift card you can sign from Bad Santa.

Why some gifts get stolen three times

Watch any game and the same three things decide it.

• Everyone can use it. The gift that suits the graduate, the CFO and the bloke from IT is the one with the longest queue.
• It looks generous on the table. Bad Santa is a visual game. A full box or a bulging sack draws a crowd before anyone reads the tag.
• There is no size or taste risk. Nobody steals a jumper that might not fit. Everybody steals the chocolate.

Food and drink pass all three, which is why a box of good snacks has a habit of being stolen in round two and again in round five. Bonus points for anything that can be opened and shared on the spot: a gift that feeds the room makes its owner very popular for the rest of the game.

Bad Santa gifts for a $30 limit

Our smallest Christmas gift boxes sit just under $40, so at $30 you are building your own. Keep it edible and keep it in one container, so it reads as one gift.

• The hot chocolate kit: a good drinking chocolate, marshmallows and a mug.
• The cheese night in: crackers, a jar of quince paste and a cheese knife. The cheese is the winner's job.
• The snack crate: two bags of fancy chips, a dip and something sweet.

Wrap it well and nobody will guess it cost less than the box beside it. Better still, talk the office up to $40, where the ready-made boxes start.

Bad Santa gifts for a $40 limit

This is where the stealing gets serious.

• The Merry Christmas Nibbles Box: an alcohol-free box of salty snacks and butter shortbread under a navy Merry Christmas sleeve. Made for sharing at the desk, which is exactly why it gets stolen.
• The Celebrate Shiraz & Chocolates Gift Box: a bottle of Shiraz with chocolates in a black gift box. The wine drinkers circle it from round one. Enjoy responsibly.

Decide before the game whether delivery counts toward the limit: our hampers under $100 carry a flat $14.95 standard delivery.

Bad Santa gifts for a $50 limit

At $50 the gifts start to look like proper hampers, and the final round gets tense.

• The Merry Christmas Gift Sack: sweet and savoury treats in a Santa sack, and alcohol-free. Nobody leaves a Santa sack on the table.
• The Ultimate Tea & Biscuits Hamper: a tea cup with its own infuser and a box of melting moments. The tea drinkers' pick, and alcohol-free.
• A cheeseboard hamper, for the person already planning their Christmas Day spread. A board looks generous on the table and gets used long after the game.

There are more in our Christmas gifts under $50.

If your office stretches to $60

• The Merry Makers Hamper: a gingerbread house kit with hot chocolate and lollies. Every parent in the room will want it for the school holidays.
• The Classic Christmas Basket: alcohol-free sweet and savoury treats in a keepsake basket that outlasts the snacks.

The $30 to $60 hampers have the rest.

The gifts nobody steals

Every game has them. The scented candle in a colour nobody chose. Novelty socks. The joke gift that gets one laugh, then lives under a desk until March. The mug with a pun on it. None of them are terrible, they are simply never anyone's first pick, and in Bad Santa that means they go home with whoever had the worst luck in the draw.

The fix is simple: buy something you would steal yourself.

Make a $40 gift look like more

Bad Santa is judged on the table before anyone opens a thing, so presentation counts double. Choose a gift that arrives boxed or in a sack rather than loose, add a proper tag, and keep it in one piece: one generous box beats three small items taped together. A gift card signed "Bad Santa" adds a little theatre for free.

For a team that does not drink

Plenty of offices keep the game alcohol-free, and the best steals still work. The Merry Christmas Nibbles Box, the Merry Christmas Gift Sack, the Ultimate Tea & Biscuits Hamper and the Classic Christmas Basket are all alcohol-free, and chocolate, tea and snacks get stolen just as hard as any bottle.

When the business buys the gifts

Some workplaces fund the whole game as their Christmas thank-you. If that is you, order every gift in one go and mix three or four different boxes, so the table has variety and the steals have something to aim at. Keep at least half of them alcohol-free, put one stretch gift in the pile as the prize everyone chases, and have them delivered to the office the week before the party so nothing is left to chance. Our corporate team can take the whole order, with one GST tax invoice.

Bring a gift worth fighting over

Order before 1pm Melbourne time on a weekday, public holidays excepted, and we hand-pack your hamper in Victoria and dispatch it the same day, with a free personalised gift card you can sign from Bad Santa. Browse our Secret Santa hampers for the game, or gifts to share if the office would rather pool the money for one big hamper. If you are running the game as well, our Bad Santa rules cover steals, locks and the final round, and Kris Kringle gift ideas has more for a straight draw.