₹500 a head is where most large teams in India end up, and rarely because anyone decided it was the right amount. It is usually what the approved total comes to once it is divided by the headcount.
It is a perfectly good budget. But it behaves differently from a bigger one, and three things decide what works inside it:
- Delivery is a real share of it. Flat ₹70 to each home is fourteen per cent of ₹500.
- Identical is the honest default. Individual gifts at this price cost more in collecting time than in money.
- The best gifts are about the team, because an object bought for ₹450 has to compete with everything else anyone could buy for ₹450.
The arithmetic first
| Shipped to | Delivery per head | Left for the gift |
|---|---|---|
| Fifty separate homes | ₹70 | ₹430 |
| One office, fifty people | About ₹1.40 | Almost all ₹500 |
| A mix — office for most, homes for remote staff | Somewhere between | Work it out before choosing |
That table changes the list below more than anything else. And fifty of anything is arranged by message rather than through the website, which takes up to twenty copies an order line. If the gift is going to homes, plan for about ₹430. If it is going to one office, the whole ₹500 is available — but someone has to hand them out, and two people will never collect theirs. Gifting for remote teams →
Twelve that work under ₹500
About the team
1. Thirty prints of the team’s year — ₹270. The launch, the offsite, the whiteboard, the Diwali lunch, the person who left in June. For a team that shared a real year, thirty prints of it beat most ₹450 objects — identical for everyone, and not generic, because everyone was in that year. At this budget they fit comfortably even with home delivery. Lamination adds ₹3 a print if they are going on office walls. Polaroid prints for a team →
2. Your own company magazine, printed. If someone on the team already designs an internal newsletter or a year-end annual, the gift can be that, printed properly on magazine paper. An A4 magazine you have designed, of 8, 12 or 16 pages (the cover counts as pages), costs ₹299 to ₹399 a copy to print with us, which stays under ₹500 even delivered to a home. Up to twenty copies go through the website in one order; for more, message us first. Get your magazine printed →
3. An 8-page magazine of the year, made for you — ₹499. It fits only when a large batch goes to one office; delivered to a home it comes to ₹569. Twenty-four photographs, designed and proofed, one copy each.
4. One shared object per team, not per person. A 27-card deck with one card per colleague is ₹999 for a team of up to about twenty-five — for a team of twenty, about ₹50 a head (the 52-card deck, ₹1,699, takes up to fifty) — with the rest of the budget left for something each person takes home. Card decks as a group gift →
Things people use up
5. Sweets or dry fruit, from somewhere local. The Diwali default, and not a bad one — though at Diwali it arrives beside several others from vendors. It stands out when it comes from a shop the team actually knows rather than a catalogue.
6. Tea or coffee from a small grower. Consumed, not stored, and nobody has too much of it.
7. A book, chosen per person by their manager. Cheap in money, expensive in thought — which is the point. It only works if the manager actually knows what each person reads.
Things that are not objects
8. A team lunch instead. ₹500 a head buys a decent lunch in most Indian cities, and a lunch where the team sits together is remembered longer than most things in a box.
9. A donation to a cause the team picks. Let them choose it, by vote. A donation in their name to a cause the company chose is the company’s gift to itself.
10. A half-day off. Not something you can buy, and often what people want most. Pair it with anything else on this list.
The part that costs nothing
11. A handwritten note from their manager. One line, specific, about something that person did this year. It turns any gift on this page into a personal one, and it is what people keep after the sweets are gone.
12. Their name on it, if the gift allows. A varied name or one line per person barely changes the cost of a printed gift we design, because it is a field filled in rather than a new design. For a magazine you design yourself, a different line in each copy means a different file for each — ask before planning on it. How bulk orders handle a varied line →
A combination that fits the band
The version most teams should start from, handed out at one office:
| Part | Roughly |
|---|---|
| Thirty prints of the year | ₹270 |
| A small box of sweets from a shop the team knows | ₹150 or so |
| A share of one ₹70 delivery | A rupee or two |
| A handwritten line from their manager | Nothing |
About ₹420 a head, and it covers all three things a team gift can do: something to keep, something to share at home, and something that proves a person noticed them.
Going to homes instead, keep the prints and the ₹70 delivery — ₹340 — add lamination at ₹3 a print, and send the manager’s line as a message the day the parcel lands. That is ₹430, and nothing in it has to survive a van.
What survives the post
If part of the team is remote, the gift has to survive three to five days with a courier — in an Indian summer or a monsoon. That rules things out that would be fine handed over at a desk.
Prints, cards and magazines travel well. Flat, light, and indifferent to heat.
Chocolate does not, for about half the year. It arrives as a single mass.
Sweets with milk in them should not spend four days in a van.
Plants rarely arrive looking like the photograph, and many die within the fortnight.
Choose one gift that works for everyone rather than a nice one for the office and a lesser substitute for remote staff. The remote half notices.
When ₹500 is the wrong number
For one person’s milestone. Twenty years of service, a retirement, a departure after a long run. Spend more on the few, not the same on everyone. Corporate gifts under ₹1,000 per head →
For clients. A client gift is judged against a different standard, and against their own company’s rules on what may be accepted. Client gifting without breaking the rules →
What does not work at ₹500
A branded object nobody asked for. The ₹400 logo mug, the lanyard, the notebook with the company’s name on the cover. They are used once in the office and never at home. Branded or personalised →
Electronics at this price. A ₹450 power bank or speaker looks like a ₹450 power bank or speaker, and it tends to stop working inside the year.
A large-looking hamper. At ₹500, a hamper that looks generous is mostly basket, straw and cellophane. A smaller box of one good thing reads as more.
Anything that has to be explained. If the gift needs a note saying why it was chosen, it was chosen for the budget rather than the person.
Timing
Most ₹500-a-head budgets are Diwali budgets, and Diwali is when couriers are slowest and every supplier is busiest. Anything made to order needs ordering weeks earlier than feels necessary. When to order for Diwali →
If finance needs a GST invoice or a new vendor set up, settle the supplier before anything else — the paperwork takes longer than the gift. GST and corporate gift procurement →
Frequently asked
What is a good corporate gift under ₹500? Something about the team’s actual year — thirty prints of it at ₹270 is the strongest option — with a handwritten line from each person’s manager.
Does delivery come out of the ₹500? It should. Flat ₹70 to each home address is fourteen per cent of the budget. Shipping to one office avoids most of it.
Can we print our own company magazine as the gift? Yes. An A4 magazine you have designed, of 8, 12 or 16 pages with the cover counted, prints at ₹299 to ₹399 a copy, which stays under ₹500 even with home delivery.
Should gifts at this price be personalised? A name or a line per person, yes — on anything we design it barely changes the cost. Individual gifts per person, rarely; the collecting takes longer than the budget justifies.
What should we avoid at ₹500 a head? Branded objects nobody asked for, cheap electronics, and hampers that are mostly packaging.
Part of our guide to gifting for large teams. See also: corporate gifts under ₹1,000 per head and the corporate gifting budget per employee.
For teams and bulk orders: Corporate and bulk gifting · Polaroid prints from ₹270 · Get Your Magazine Printed