Corporate events play a crucial role in team building and brand awareness. They double as opportunities to foster community, celebrate company wins, expand your reach, and connect with your team. And every good party (or event) has party favors! Gifts work in tandem with corporate events as tokens of appreciation and physical reminders of your values and community.
We’ve worked with companies like Uber and Walmart on large-scale event activations that included marketing collateral, branded apparel, and loads of creative gifts. Some products make better gifts than others depending on the scale and occasion, so we categorized our list of corporate event gift ideas by five different event genres.
We already have established relationships with every vendor listed below (plus many more), so everything you see is in within quick and easy reach!
Need to Skim? Key Takeaways:
- For each corporate event, choose gifts that fit its unique vibe: personalized items for retreats, tech gadgets for conferences, and promotional products for trade shows.
- Pick practical, memorable gifts like eco-friendly items, interactive products, and exclusive samples to create lasting impressions.
- Use event gifts to build connections and brand awareness with group activities, experience-based gifts, and motivational items that strengthen your community.
Table of Contents
- Company Retreat Gift Ideas
- Conference Gift Ideas
- Trade Show Gift Ideas
- Launch Party Gift Ideas
- Team Building Event Gift Ideas
Company Retreat Gift Ideas
Company retreats are literally designed to bring people closer. Commemorate the event with gifts that match the retreat’s location, purpose, and overall vibe. For example, your gifts would probably be different at a retreat meant for unplugging in nature versus team building in an urban environment.
Personalized Items
Personalized items such as monogrammed trendy towels or custom yet chic water bottles give the retreat an extra special and custom touch. Bonus points if these products can be put to use at the retreat!
Relaxation Kits
If relaxation is one goal of the retreat, promote R&R with custom relaxation kits. These kits might include soothing products like custom hand poured candles, weighted silk eye masks, luxurious bath salts, or organic mind and body wash.
Read 7 of our event ideas that boost company culture.
Conference Gift Ideas
Conferences are common and effective opportunities to connect with coworkers, particularly for remote teams that don’t get together often. Some conferences are more exciting than others, but thoughtful gifts can make even the most boring seminar or summit a memorable experience. Read more about team building initiatives that we’ve found effective for our global team.
Tech Gadgets
Tech gadgets make great gifts for any professional, because most people rely on gadgets for their productivity! Portable bluetooth speakers or travel-sized power banks are safe options for commuters, WFH-ers, and hybrid workers.
Office Supplies
Branded office supplies like premium hardcover notebooks and unique pens are as desirable as they are practical. Everyone uses these products, plus they’re easy to hand out or travel with at work conferences.
Eco-Friendly Gifts
Custom tote bags are popular eco-friendly gifts because they promote cutting back on single-use plastic bags while also promoting your brand when people carry them around the conference (as well as the store or farmers market once the conference is over). Chic yet durable insulated cups are another easily customizable, eco-friendly option to promote reducing waste while boosting brand awareness.
Trade Show Gift Ideas
A trade show is the perfect place to hand out gifts because people are already hungry to network and connect with your brand. For trade shows, you’ll want to choose gifts that are practical for the occasion — branded products that are easy to carry around and also serve a purpose.
Promotional Items
Promotional items like branded lanyards and premium keychains are common at trade shows because people typically wear badges and credentials. The key (no pun intended) is to create promotional items that stand out from the competition with innovative features or designs.
Interactive Gifts
Interactive gifts such as puzzles, games, or stress balls can do a great job of engaging attendees and creating a memorable experience with your brand. Fully customize your own Rubik’s cube or put your branding on a magnetic tic-tac-toe game for personalized fun.
Health and Wellness
With all the travel and handshakes that accompany trade shows, promoting health and wellness through gifts is a savvy idea. Branded hand sanitizers or custom fitness bands serve as value-driven marketing collateral and are more likely to be used long after the trade show is over. Check out this set of resistance bands or this running armband by our partner, Lululemon.
Product Launch Party Gift Ideas
Product launch parties are awesome team-building and brand-awareness-boosting events. And gifts have the power to make a good party even greater. Gifts that correlate with and promote the product launch will make every attendee feel part of something special.
Branded Merchandise
Promote the launch with branded merchandise like apparel or drinkware. These products do a great job of spreading awareness about your brand to those who weren’t at the party or haven’t yet been introduced to you. Cuts Clothing makes chic, customizable T-shirts for men and women while this ceramic mug by Fellow is a unisex option that upgrades the coffee-drinking experience.
Exclusive Samples
Exclusive samples not only ramp up the excitement for the new product, but they create a sense of exclusivity and camaraderie among party attendees.
Themed Gifts
A themed gift that is relevant to the new product is an easy and effective way to align attendees with the product launch. For example, you could assemble kits with gourmet food, private-labeled hot sauce, cookbooks, custom spice kits, or branded kitchen aprons for a food product launch, or put together a kit that follows the same color scheme and category of the new product.
Team Building Event Gift Ideas
Gifts that accompany team building events will remind participants of the experience every time they use the products. Read more about why corporate gifting is important for connecting teams. Make sure the gift correlates with the general theme of your team building event to create a cohesive, memorable brand story.
Group Activities
Foster teamwork by giving gifts that can be used during your team building event such as board games or sports equipment like Pickleball. Attendees can also use this kind of gift outside of work, making it a sustainable and practical option.
Experience-Based Gifts
As part of your team building event, present attendees with experience-based gifts such as vouchers for escape rooms or cooking classes to encourage continued “unplugged” opportunities for connection.
Motivational Items
Gifting motivational items like thank you cards, inspirational books or custom awards will establish a positive connotation for your team building event for months to come. Choose a book or award that correlates with the topics or challenges that were addressed or overcome during the event.
Create Gifts That Last With Imprint Engine
Planning events is stressful, but we’re here to make your job easier. Delegate the gifting process to a partner you can count on. Contact us to get started planning a gifting strategy for your next corporate event.
Let’s make your events memorable
