Every Australian office has a cupboard. In that cupboard are branded pens, three unopened bottles of shiraz, a keep cup with someone else's logo on it, and a hamper containing a jar of quince paste that will outlive us all.
Corporate gifting has a low bar because most of it is bought under time pressure by someone whose actual job is something else. Which is good news, because clearing that bar is not hard once you know what actually matters.
We do a lot of this — client gifts, staff thank-yous, conference tables, end-of-year runs — so here's what we've learned, including the bits that don't favour us.
The three questions that decide everything
Before you look at a single product, answer these. They eliminate about 80% of the options and save you an afternoon.
1. Is it going to one person or a room? A gift for a named client needs to look like a gift — boxed, presented, with a card. A gift for a floor of forty people needs to be individually wrapped so nobody has to touch someone else's food. These are completely different products and confusing them is the most common mistake.
2. Will they be there when it arrives? Distributed teams and hybrid weeks have broken a lot of gifting. Fresh flowers and fresh food sent to an office on a Thursday when everyone works from home on Fridays is money on fire. Either send to home addresses, or send something with a shelf life.
3. What does it say about you? A generic hamper says you had a budget line to spend. Something made by an actual named business says you chose it. That difference is the entire value of the gift.
What to spend, per head
Rough Australian market rates, from what we see:
| Per person | What that buys | Right for |
|---|---|---|
| $3 – $6 | An individually wrapped item | Conferences, event tables, welcome packs, whole-floor gestures |
| $20-$25 | A small boxed or tubed gift | Staff thank-you's, teacher gifts, small teams |
| $40 – $60 | A proper boxed gift with a card | Named clients, referral thank-you's, milestone recognition |
| $100+ | Premium or personalised | Key accounts, deal closes, board-level |
The most common budgeting error is spreading a fixed pot too thin — forty $8 gifts that all feel cheap, when twelve $30 gifts to the people who actually matter would have landed properly. Be honest about who the gift is really for.
Ideas that work, and who they work for
Individually wrapped food, for volume
The workhorse. Nobody is allergic to being handed something sealed and labelled, nobody has to serve it, and it doesn't need refrigeration or a plate. It survives the gap between arriving and being eaten, which matters more than people expect.
Our mini cookies start at $175 for fifty, which is $3.50 a head. Every one is labelled with ingredients, allergens and nutritional information — the thing a compliance-minded office will actually ask you for. The best flavour to suit everyone? You can't go past our classic chocolate chip cookie. It is allergen friendly (no nuts) and a certain crowd-pleaser.
A boxed gift, for named people
When the recipient has a name and you want them to remember who sent it. The presentation is doing half the work here, so this is the wrong place to economise.
Our six-cookie gift box and fifteen-mini box both start at $350 for ten boxes. A single RRP box of chunky cookies runs at $45 per box, so you're getting a sharp discount for corporate pricing.
Something with their name on it
Personalisation dramatically outperforms volume when the audience is small. A message written on the gift itself — not on a card attached to it — reads as effort in a way nothing else does.
Our message brownies have the message written in white chocolate on the brownie.
Something with your logo on it
Branding food is a fine line. Done well it's charming; done badly it's an ad someone has to eat. Our view: brand the box, not the product — with one exception, which is logo cupcakes, where the logo is printed on an edible disc and it genuinely photographs well at launches and conferences. Those are pickup-only from our Brisbane and Gold Coast stores.
Something that isn't food at all
Worth saying, since we sell food: if the recipient has a dietary restriction you don't know about, or you're gifting into a culture or context where food is awkward, don't force it. A book is a genuinely good corporate gift — it has no shelf life problem, it doesn't need to be shared, and it doesn't assume anything about the recipient's diet. We're biased about which book, obviously.
Things people get wrong
Ordering too late. November and December are booked out across the entire industry, not just here. If you want end-of-year gifts, order in October. Every year a lot of people find this out in the third week of December.
Forgetting the mail room. Large buildings hold deliveries at reception, sometimes for days. Always put a recipient name and a phone number on the delivery, and if it's going to a hotel or a venue, include the arrival date so they know to hold it.
Assuming one address works. If half the team is remote, one office delivery reaches half the team. Splitting to individual addresses costs more per unit but doesn't waste half the order. We charge $15 per address.
Skipping the card. Without a card there is nothing in the parcel with your name on it. This sounds obvious. It is the single most common omission we see, and it makes the entire gift anonymous.
Not checking the tax position. In Australia, gifts to staff can attract fringe benefits tax depending on value and type, and the rules differ for entertainment versus non-entertainment gifts. There are thresholds worth knowing about before you commit a budget. We're bakers, not accountants — ask yours, ideally before you order rather than after.
Lead times, honestly
For us: a week is comfortable for standard boxes, two weeks for volumes over a hundred or anything with custom packaging. We bake and dispatch Monday to Thursday, so an order placed Thursday afternoon goes out the following Monday. Sydney is usually one business day from dispatch, Melbourne one to two.
If you're in a capital city
We've put together the specifics for each city — what can be collected, what has to be delivered, and how long it takes:
- Corporate gifts in Sydney — delivered express, plus pick-up available at our Barangaroo flagship
- Corporate gifts in Melbourne — delivered express, plus Chapel Street and Chadstone available for pick-up
- Corporate gifts in Brisbane — collection available from both our Fortitude Valley and Fish Lane flagships, which makes it easy to click and collect in store
Catering an event rather than sending gifts? That's a different job with different sizes — see Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane cookie catering.
The short version
Individually wrapped for a room. Boxed and carded for a person. Order six weeks earlier than feels necessary if it's December. Put a name on the delivery. Ask your accountant about FBT.
And send something a real business made, because the whole point of a gift is that someone chose it.
If that's us — the full range is on our corporate gifting page, or email orders@brookibakehouse.com with your headcount, date and budget and we'll come back with options.
