Busy Baby Baskets

Well what a hectic fortnight it has been! My little apprentice baby basket-maker-upper has been on holiday, and it was down to me to cover for her, and assemble and gift wrap all the baby gift baskets myself.

Thank goodness she is back and has taken over again. I’d forgotten what hard work it was! We offer so many different types of baby gift baskets, and every single one we create is unique. Which means of course that an extraordinary amount of much time and energy is invested into each one to make its presentation as eye catching, and cute as possible. After all what’s the point of sending a baby gift basket as gifts if they don’t have that “aawwh” factor.

And to make things even harder my children (our company directors) have decided to launch our new build-your-own-baby-gift-basket website, where customers can self select their own baby clothes, shoes, toys etc… Of course this is proving to be incredibly popular, but it now means there is very little standardisation, due to the practically endless variants. But that’s just our mentality here at Basketsgalore – we can never be accused of taking the easy option. If something is too easy then everybody will be doing it.

So this week I have a chance to catch my breath and catch up on my more sedate, office based work. It was very nice to be involved more hands on, with all our lovely baby products. It gave me a chance to appreciate what a huge selection of beautiful gift items we have in stock – old and new. And it’s nice to see that our range is constantly evolving, as different products are being introduced by the purchasing team. As our business is family owned and run, all the products that we stock are hand picked as if they were presents for our own children - or in my case grandchildren. We literally test them out ourselves. All the clothing items are carefully checked for quality of material and stitching. Many samples that are sent to us are dismissed if it is thought that the material is inferior, or the stitching or embroidery could rub against a baby's delicate skin. Rest assured that if a baby outfit reaches one of our hampers that it is of the highest quality and value. Along with Natures Purest Organics, we’ve included the Olive and Moss of London designer range of baby outfits and Mini Vanilla England. All of which are flying off the shelves!

All the Toys in our baby baskets are big brand names, and therefore adhere to the strictest quality controls and safety tests. We would never use inferior pink and blue teddy bears that you’ll find being used by many florists. Baby booties and shoes are another popular gift choice. Our range is constantly being updated, and now includes Inch Blue leather shoes and the most adoreable little sheepskin boots you will ever see! Little baby socks in the shape like a rose bud on a stem have been added to the range last month. Beautiful photo frames, and wooden trinket boxes have also appeared. Alas, our best selling Dinky Donkey range by Russ Berrie is now coming to an end. It's always sad when a product line finishes and isn’t being manufactured again, but we must move on and try to replace it with something equally cute.

Speaking of which I must get back to my office work now. There are dozens more new gift items to be added to the create-your-own-baby-basket website, more photography to be taken, and new readymade baby baskets to design. Phew, maybe it was easier being in the warehouse assembling the baskets after all…………!

Selina (aka Krafty)