Want to Make the Holidays Happy for Our Oceans? Here are Some Sustainable Gift Ideas

Kasandra Kutzer

What’s the Deal with Traditional Shopping?

As the holiday season approaches, people are scrambling to buy gifts for friends and family. With the excitement of the festivities and the stress of planning occupying our minds, the last thing we’re thinking about is how all this mass shopping is affecting the environment. It’s easy to forget that on top of the impact of product use, maintenance, and disposal, producing goods that later become gifts is an involved process requiring extraction of raw materials, manufacturing, packaging, and distribution. These steps can impact the environment and public health by contributing to toxic exposures, air and water pollution, climate change, waste disposal, and ecosystem damages. Additionally, the use, production, and disposal of gifts and other products rely heavily on natural resources such as energy, water, and other materials.

These effects are evident when examining the impact of holiday shopping on carbon emissions. Research shows that holiday shopping accounts for 5.5% of carbon emissions per family, despite the holiday season accounting for only 1% of the year. In other words, carbon emissions are disproportionately higher by a magnitude of 5 during the holidays! This issue is so widespread that even people who would otherwise consider themselves eco-friendly fall into non-sustainable shopping habits during Christmastime. The main reason for this is that while an immediate family may have eco-friendly habits, their extended family may not. Thus, these families feel pressured to provide common mass-produced gifts to those extended family members to maintain their social standings.

The negative impact of non-sustainable gift shopping is also apparent when addressing its impact on waste. For example, unwanted Christmas gifts alone account for an equivalent of 80 kilograms of carbon dioxide per person. This metric is important when considering what often happens to these unwanted gifts. Not only do such gifts account for these carbon emissions, they often end up further polluting the environment from within landfills. Following Christmas, 25% of British adults aged 25-34 will throw away fashion items rather than resell them. This is likely due to the fact that about a third of British adults feel that it is rude to resell an unwanted gift. While this issue is less widespread here in the United States, it is still a problem. About 16% of Americans will also throw away unwanted gifts, while only about a third would resell them. Even if you decide to return an unwanted item to the store rather than throw it away, it may still contribute to waste, as stores often throw away returned items instead of reselling them. 

How Can We Fix This?

So, if buying Christmas gifts damages the environment, and returning those you don’t want still contributes to waste, how can you mitigate these issues without abandoning the festivities altogether? Well, you could focus on the root of the problem by seeking out gifts that minimally impact the environment in the first place whether by mitigating waste or reducing carbon emissions. Such products include cast iron cookware, bar shampoos and conditioners, jewelry made from materials that have been recycled or obtained via fair trade, clothing made from recycled polyester, and plantable pencils. Cookware made from cast iron tends to be more sustainable because they are durable and made without the use of synthetic coatings, meaning they will not need to be replaced as much and thus prevent waste. Bar shampoos and conditioners prevent both waste and carbon emissions by using less packaging made from natural materials. The use of such packaging rather than traditional bottles reduces emissions because it eliminates the use of plastic, the production of which accounts for 3% of global carbon emissions. Plantable pencils are a green gift choice because they reduce waste, as once the pencil is used, it can be planted rather than thrown away.

Rather than finding alternatives to traditional, mass-produced gifts, you could also think outside the box and find gifts that avoid the process of mass-production altogether. You can do so by giving more unique gifts such as plants from local and sustainable sources, products from local breweries and distilleries, and handmade crafts made by local artists. You could even give your loved ones homemade artisan goods if you have your own garden! Another option is to give second-hand gifts, which is both the most sustainable way to give a physical gift and can save you money.

Why Should You Gift Sustainably?

So, why does it matter? You may be wondering if you would really be making a difference by shopping sustainably and boycotting non-sustainable products this holiday season. The good news is that in general, boycotting accomplishes positive change effectively! This is true for many reasons, including the fact that boycotting is a good way to express your dissent. For example, following a widespread boycott of Nestlé’s unethical marketing to new mothers, the World Health Organization established new guidelines for the marketing of baby formula. Boycotts have also been shown to push corporations to make positive changes, as they are incentivized to prevent or quickly end boycotts due to the negative publicity they create. One example of this is the improvement of working conditions for Nike’s employees as a result of boycotts, an action that was followed by other sporting companies for fear of being boycotted next. Boycotting has even been able to shut down entire unethical industries, such as wild-animal circuses, which were banned in many European countries following boycotts. Finally, the goals of boycotts have proven to be achievable. For example, organizations called for Puma to be boycotted until it divested from Israel’s football team, followed by said divestment eventually occurring.

Therefore, boycotting companies that produce goods unsustainably by shopping for sustainable alternatives can similarly lead to positive results. By purchasing eco-friendly gifts this holiday season, you can express your disdain for products that damage the environment and push corporations to adopt more sustainable practices. You could even shut down the production and use of goods that are inherently unsustainable. These outcomes will ultimately lead to the goal of producing goods more sustainably being achieved.

“Wrapping” Up

Traditional gift giving by shopping for unsustainable, mass-produced goods is a problem because toxins are released and natural resources are used extensively during their production, use, and disposal. Such shopping practices are also a major contributor to climate change via carbon emissions, as well as waste. Such issues are not helped by the fact that our social norms encourage mass consumption during the holidays, thus creating a barrier to being eco-friendly. 

By giving sustainably, you can mitigate these issues because boycotting companies that produce goods unsustainably can express your opposition to non-eco-friendly practices, push companies to use greener production methods, eliminate the use of products that are fundamentally non-sustainable, and result in the widespread use of greener production. 

Gifts such as cast iron pans and bar shampoos and conditioners can help prevent waste. Additionally, jewelry made using recycled materials and clothes made with recycled polyester prevent these materials from otherwise being thrown away. Second-hand gifts also prevent waste because they get used when they would have otherwise been thrown away or left abandoned on a shelf. Gifts such as bar shampoos and conditioners are also environmentally friendly because they reduce carbon emissions. Since mass-produced products increase carbon emissions, giving handmade, local, or second-hand ones when you would have otherwise purchased something mass-produced also reduces said emissions. By shopping consciously this holiday season, we can all play a part in healing our earth.

Citations

1. Causeartist. (2024, May 14). 50 Ethical and Eco-Friendly Replacements to Everyday Products. Causeartist. https://www.causeartist.com/eco-friendly-ethical-alternatives-everyday-products/. 

2. Chicago Environmentalists. (2022). Sustainable Gift Guide. Chicago Environmentalists. https://www.chicagoenvironmentalists.org/sustainable-gift-guide. 

3. Farbotko, C., Head, L. (2013, December). Gifts, sustainable consumption and giving up green anxieties at Christmas. Geoforum, 50, 88 – 96. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2013.08.004.

4. Owens, J. (2025, May 13). Are boycotts effective? Ethical Consumer. https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/are-boycotts-effective.

5. Ritchie, H. (2023, October 5). How much of global greenhouse gas emissions come from plastics? Our World in Data. https://ourworldindata.org/ghg-emissions-plastics.

6. Sustainable Brands Staff. (2025, January 7). Studies Reveal the Dire Impacts of Bad Gift Giving. Sustainable Brands. https://sustainablebrands.com/read/studies-dire-impacts-bad-gift-giving.

7. United States Environmental Protection Agency. (2024, December 6). Why Buy Greener Products? United States Environmental Protection Agency. https://www.epa.gov/greenerproducts/why-buy-greener-products.