5 Unexpected Themes for your White Elephant Party
Setting a theme for your White Elephant, Yankee Swap or Dirty Santa Gift Exchange is a great way to mix up your event, whether it’s an in-person event or a party for your virtual team. There are plenty of rules to White Elephant, but the theme is something you can truly make your own. We’ve talked in the past about Classic White Elephant Themes you can employ, as well as some more offbeat & fun gift themes. Today we’re kicking it up a notch, and bringing you 5 truly unusual (but fun!) themes that your holiday party guests will be talking about all year: themes based on the 5 senses.
When you set a White Elephant theme that can be interpreted in all sorts of ways, it’s fun to see what happens! If you have a really creative group of friends, family or co-workers this holiday, give one of these a try!
5 Wacky & Unexpected Gift Themes for your White Elephant Party
#1 Sight: Every Gift Must include a rainbow
OK, this is random. A rainbow? You’d be surprised how creative people could get with something like a “rainbow” theme. There are mugs, jewelry, t-shirts and much much more. And you know if it has a rainbow on it, it’s going to be positive and fun. Not into rainbows? No problem - choose any color or visual theme you like. Maybe it has to contain red & green for Christmas. Or maybe it must include artwork of some sort. Whatever Yankee Swap theme you think will get your group thinking and excited.
#2 Smell: Every gift must have a scent to it
There are many directions you and your group could go with this White Elephant theme. Candles are a holiday mainstay, so those could certainly make an appearance, along with various related products like incense or diffusers. Food & beverage is another option: those home baked cookies sure have a scent to them. So does that hunk of Roquefort cheese. If you want to expand the interpretation even further, there’s all sorts of things you could bring that “stink”. Think a DVD of Home Alone 3 - not the greatest movie. Open it up and see what happens!
#3 Touch: Every gift must be soft to the touch
You could really pick any tactile quality you want (“everything must be spikey”) but it feels like choosing ‘soft’ is the safest and likely cutest option. White Elephant participants could go for clothing: soft sweaters, mittens and hats - perfect for the cold winter season. There could be toys and teddy bears. Even self-care objects like stress balls would fit the bill.
#4 Hearing: Every gift must makes a sound
This one is really fun. There are so many things out there that make noise. Think musical instruments - even to fit a Yankee Swap budget there are a bunch of options: a harmonica, pocket synth, ukulele, and more. You could go in the ‘toy’ direction, where there are a million and one toys just ready to drive you mad with their incessant noise. And finally - any audio device is a nice twist, like a Bluetooth speaker or set of headphones.
#5 Taste: Every gift must be edible
‘Taste’ is a theme you could take in a lot of directions, for example requiring certain types of food and beverage, or saying ‘only international foods’, but we like taking the general ‘anything edible’ approach. While you’ll get a share of expected items like booze or baked goods, maybe someone will go rogue and realize: you didn’t said edible to whom. Why - maybe a bag of bird seed or pet food is a perfect White Elephant gift (especially if you want a few odd ball gifts in there to mix it up!). Just be careful, in certain states if you say the theme is “Edibles” you may end up with some not-approved gummies or brownies!
#6 BONUS THEME (All Senses): Every gift must evoke one of the senses
Here’s one to bring it all together. We know some of the other themes may seem a little too limiting, especially if your remote holiday party is with a larger group. You don’t want to end up with too many of the same type of gifts. So this theme broadens it to include all the senses! Each individual can choose which sense they want to go with, and how they want to interpret it. It’s the perfect way to host a wacky white elephant gift exchange without completely stumping your guests.
We hope you enjoyed these off-the-wall White Elephant theme ideas! Let us know if you try them and how it turned out!