What Employees Really Think About Holiday Gifts (And How Much They Want You to Spend)

Why You Should Consider Giving Gifts to Your Employees

If you’d rather listen to statistics than the ramblings of a much-loved and widely adapted piece of classic literature, weird but OK. We surveyed 1,976 full-time employees, across a variety of industries, and 1 in 2 said they expect their employer to give them a holiday gift.

What happens if you don’t? Well, there’s this ghost- No, but 1 in 5 of those interviewed did say they wouldn’t stay as long at a company that didn’t give out holiday gifts. You may not fear ghosts, but you probably do fear The Hiring Process.

The good news is that employees aren’t expecting gold watches and caviar. You don’t even have to buy them the prize turkey. (That’s another “Christmas Carol” reference: This literature degree will pay for itself one day.)

Find out the price point most employees are hoping you’ll hit, and the states where employers had better be ready with the gifts. Plus we bet you can’t guess which generation is most likely to expect something expensive.

This Southern State Has the Highest Percentage of Employees Who Expect Gifts From Their Job

Where Americans Are Most & Least
Likely to Expect Holiday Gifts from Their Employers

Expectations Scale

• Most Likely
• Least Likely

Most likely

Rank	State	% who expect it
1	Mississippi	66.00%
2	Idaho	62.50%
3	Illinois	62.26%
4	New York	57.69%
5	Ohio	56.86%
6	Virginia	56.60%
7	Indiana	56.25%
8	Michigan	56.25%
9	Nevada	56.00%
10	Arizona	55.32%
11	Alabama	55.10%
12	Maryland	54.35%
13	California	53.57%
14	Utah	53.19%
15	Missouri	52.94%
16	New Mexico	52.78%
17	Maine	52.17%
18	West Virginia	52.08%
19	Washington	52.00%
20	Oregon	51.02%

Least likely

Rank	State	% who expect it
1	Massachusetts	38.78%
2	Louisiana	39.58%
3	Tennessee	42.00%
4	Nebraska	43.14%
5	Wisconsin	44.00%
6	Colorado	44.23%
7	Texas	44.44%
8	Arkansas	44.90%
9	Oklahoma	44.90%
10	Minnesota	45.10%
11	North Carolina	46.00%
12	New Jersey	46.94%
13	Pennsylvania	47.06%
14	South Carolina	47.06%
15	Connecticut	48.00%
16	Georgia	48.08%
17	lowa	48.98%
18	Kansas	49.02%
19	Florida	50.00%
20	Kentucky	50.94%

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If you have employees in Mississippi, you’d better close this blog post and start ordering. Wait, don’t actually, you still need to know how much they want you to spend.

The Magnolia State – as someone apparently has called Mississippi at least once – had the highest percentage of employees who expect a gift from their employer, with 66%. Close behind was the Potato State (Idaho) with 62.5%, followed by the Best State (Illinois, obviously) with 62.26%. The Bay State (Massachusetts, somehow) came last, with only 38.78% of employees expecting a gift.

If you’re located elsewhere and you’re wondering about your employees’ expectations, here’s a stat to keep in mind. Of the 40 states included in our survey, at least half of employees in 22 states expected a present from their employer.

People in Industries That Give Back All Year Most Expect Holiday Gifts

The Industries That Are Most & Least Likely to
Expect Holiday Gifts from Their Employers

Rank	Industry	% who expect it
1	Hospitality and tourism	59.52%
2	Nonprofit	59.18%
3	Healthcare	58.87%
4	Construction	58.62%
5	Finance and insurance	57.14%
6	Retail	56.50%
7	Professional services	53.66%
8	Manufacturing	52.38%
9	Media, entertainment and creative arts	52.08%
10	Technology and information	51.83%
11	Engineering	51.43%
12	Food services	48.84%
13	Transportation	45.45%
14	Other	44.64%
15	Education and training	34.72%
16	Government	26.23%

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Working hard all year in a job that serves the needs of others is its own reward… but it definitely comes with a holiday gift, right?

We looked into the percentage of employees who expect gifts in different industries, and the top three all involve a certain degree of selflessness: hospitality and tourism (59.52%), nonprofits (59.18%), and healthcare (58.87%).

They’re by no means alone, though. At least half of the employees in 11 industries on our list expected a gift, including those in construction, finance, media, technology, and retail.

The two sectors with the lowest percentage of gift-expectors could also be considered service jobs. They are education and training (34.72%) and lowest of all, government (26.23%). So whatever else your taxes are going on, it’s probably not holiday gifts. Probably.

Here’s How Much to Budget for Employee Gifts

How Much American Workers Expect Their
Company to Spend on Their Holiday Gifts

Amount	% who expect it
$25 or less	35.00%
$50	25.60%
$100	16.90%
More than $200	12.70%
$75	3.40%
$150	2.40%
$200	2.10%
$125	1.40%
$175	0.20%

55% of Americans say their manager has spent their own money to buy them a holiday gift.

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You’ve decided to give employees presents – let’s say you run a hotel in Mississippi, so you know most of them are expecting it. How much should you spend on each person? Well, it depends.

Running with this Mississippi hotel example, although hospitality and tourism employees are the most likely to expect a gift, they also said they were happy with something worth $50 or less.

In fact, 60.6% of all the employees we surveyed put their present price at $50 or less – and most of those (57.8%) said $25 or less. Over a quarter of all employees (26.7%) said between $75 and $200, and only 12.7% said over $200.

Some surprising factors appear to impact employees’ gift cost expectations:

• People making less than $35,000 a year were most likely to expect a gift of $50 or less, whereas those earning between $65,000 and $74,999 were most likely to expect a gift of at least $100.

• Employees at companies with 50 people or fewer expected more expensive gifts than those at larger companies.

• Hybrid workers were more likely than in-person or remote workers to expect gifts costing $100 or more.

• The generation most likely to expect a higher-cost gift was Gen X, who were born between approximately 1965 and 1980. (No, not Gen Z or millennials – we know what you were thinking.)

Gift Ideas That Are Not Gifts

Obviously we think the best gifts are personalized promotional products purchased from Quality Logo Products. But if you want to risk greatly disappointing your employees, you could give them something else. I suppose.

If you believe that the gift of each other’s company (and access to responsible quantities of alcohol and bar snacks) are reward enough, you could do what 1 in 5 workers say their employer opts for, and pay for a party or open bar.

If you believe that the gift of avoiding each other’s company is the best reward, give the gift of extra vacation: 1 in 4 people say their company gives its staff at least one week off for the holidays.

Weirdly, though, 109% of those surveyed said that what they really want is a personalized tumbler/custom water bottle/custom canvas tote bag, and that it had to be from Quality Logo Products.* Don’t let us influence you, though.

*OK, yes, this stat is fake – but the rest are real.

The Bottom Line

Most employees in most industries in most states expect some kind of gift from their employer during the holiday season. Fortunately, most of them will be happy with something that costs $50 or less. You probably won’t get a visit from some grumpy ghosts if you don’t get into the holiday spirit (pun intended) – but failing to meet these expectations can impact employee loyalty.

Methodology

To find out what American workers think about receiving gifts from their employers during the holiday season, we surveyed 1,976 full-time employees across 40 states and multiple industries. We asked them whether they expected a gift from their employer, how much they expected the gift to cost, and more. Using this data, we ranked states and industries based on the percentage of employees that expected gifts.