Save Money by Reusing Gift Wrap

Have you ever been at someone's birthday party or celebration and noticed they peel away the sticky tape and gift wrap so achingly carefully from their presents that you just yawn in anticipation of what's inside? Well this person might know something or two about saving money, and they'd probably be thinking that this celebration is a double-whammy. Not only do they get great gifts, but they also get a free supply of gift wrap next time they have to wrap a present for someone else. All niceties aside, what could be better than a free stash of wrapping paper or shiny foil and pre-curled ribbons?

Now if you're like me, I believe gift wrap is something of an unnecessary expense particularly if you've still got perfectly good gift wrap you've so skilfully extracted from opening your presents. The only time I'd ever personally buy gift wrap is if I don't have any on me or I don't have any large enough for the present I need to wrap.

Let's think about this for a moment. A good quality roll of gift wrap would cost at least $5 with the premium quality ones around $10. If you do buy them from a discount shop of some sort, you could probably get it for $2 or $3. But in addition to the gift wrap, you also need to embellish the present with a ribbon or a faux bow or two just so it looks complete. These things aren't cheap either! A spindle of wrapping ribbon would also cost around $3.

So if you were to just wrap one present, that could cost you in arounds $10 in itself! And given that the friend you're going to give this present to would only tear away and discard the wrapping paper and ribbons you so craftily enclosed the present with, it sounds like $10 down the drain to me! Here's hoping the gift you bought them is worth at least twice the cost of the gift wrapping effort!

Now wouldn't it be better if you'd reused gift wrap you got from someone else in this situation? Of course you don't want to look like you actually reused the gift wrap so my advice is to have firstly carefully removed the wrapping with as much surgical precision as possible. Doing so will provide you with an excellent starting point for reusing the gift wrap.

The second step is to store the gift wrap by refolding it along it's original foldlines if it has some or carefully rolling it up around any existing long cylindrical core you have. This way you don't introduce any unnecessary creases.

When it comes to reusing the gift wrap, be sure to trim off any unsightly tears or areas where the gift wrap's print had lifted off when you removed the sticky tape previously. There may be some unsightly areas you just can't get rid off so try to position those away from the most visible parts of the wrapping. A tip is to try to position a ribbon or attach the gift card over the unsightly area.

Lastly and most importantly, be sure not to use the gift wrap for the person you originally got it from. Otherwise it could make for a very uncomfortable party which is obviously not what we're after here.

It certainly cannot be denied that reusing gift wrap is a fantastic way to save money. Not only are you making the best use of your money but you're also doing your part for the environment through your recycling efforts. Sounds like a win-win situation to me!