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cover of episode 2023 Holiday Gift Guide (Bonus Episode)

2023 Holiday Gift Guide (Bonus Episode)

2023/11/21
logo of podcast All the Hacks with Chris Hutchins

All the Hacks with Chris Hutchins

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This chapter covers a variety of home and food-related gifts, including the Coravin wine preservation system, Any Day cookware, OXO Bench Scraper, Ember mug, Trade Coffee, Zolto Denart Universal Wine Glass, Death & Co cocktail books, and the Paprika app.

Shownotes Transcript

Bye.

Hello, and welcome to a special bonus episode of All The Hacks, a show about upgrading your life, money, and travel. I'm your host, Chris Hutchins, and today this bonus episode is going to be my holiday gift guide. I'd planned to get this out in early December, but a few of the things on this list were on sale for Black Friday, so I rushed to get it out today. But because it's a bonus episode, you'll still be getting another episode tomorrow all about optimizing your tax-advantaged accounts, which was so great.

So what we're going to do today is run down some of my favorite products, gifts, and past purchases that might make good ideas for gifts for you or your loved ones this holiday season. So I'll break them down to these six sections. First, I'll do home and food, then tech and gear, then clothes and bags, followed by health and fitness, then family and kids, and finally books and learning. Then I'll wrap with a quick recap at the end on how to make sure you get the best deals this holiday season.

Also, you should know that none of the products or services I put in this gift guide have paid me to be a part of this list. However, some of them are sponsors of all the hacks, but that makes sense because as I've said before, most of my sponsors are here because I reached out to them after already loving their product.

In fact, for any of the companies I'm about to talk about who aren't sponsors, I will certainly be adding them to the list of brands to reach out to in 2024 to see if they want to work together, which actually happened for at least one brand from last year's gift guide, which was pretty cool. Also, while I normally create an allthehacks.com slash showbiz,

short link for a lot of the deals and things that I share on the show to make it easy for you to find, there would just be way too many links for this episode. So I'm only going to mention the URLs if there's a specific discount, but I will put every single link to everything in the show notes and in the written version of this gift guide, which is linked in the show notes, but you can also find it at any time at allthehacks.com slash gift.

And since a few of these links, though certainly not all of them, are from sponsors or are referral links or are affiliate links to sites like Amazon, I would greatly appreciate if you go to the show notes or to allthehacks.com slash gifts and click the links there to support me and the show. That is unless you find a better price elsewhere, in which case absolutely go there instead and maybe let me know and I'll go update that gift guide for everyone else.

Okay, let's get into the 2023 gift guide right after this.

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Okay, I'm going to start with the home and food section. And this first gift is a Coravin. And this was the number one clicked gift in last year's newsletter gift guide. So I thought I'd mention it again because there are plenty of nights where Amy or I or both of us want to have a glass of wine with dinner, but we don't really want to finish the entire bottle.

So we used to just skip the wine or end up trying to finish the whole bottle. And then we got a Coravin as a gift and it changed everything. It's a device with a small hollow needle that pierces through the cork, lets you pour out wine and replace the space that wine took up with argon gas to keep your wine fresh for the future. And it looks like right now you can get up to 40% off for Black Friday, which I'll make sure to link to in the show notes or on the written guide at allthehacks.com slash gifts.

Next is any day cookware. And after interviewing chef David Chang in episode 122, I was convinced to start cooking more in the microwave and we haven't looked back. We've made David Chang salmon rice in our any day countless times in the microwave and it is so good every time.

I'm also a big fan of David's book, Cooking at Home, which would also make a great gift. And you can get 15% off any day at allthehacks.com slash any day. Or this is one brand where if you're an All the Hacks member, you can actually get 20% off with the link in the member site. And if you're interested in joining, you can go to allthehacks.com slash join.

Next is an OXO Bench Scraper. And I can't remember how a podcast episode about finding a job and negotiating compensation included the recommendation for this product.

But now we have a bench scraper in the kitchen and we use it all the time for scooping up vegetables, scraping off the counters. We even have a non-metal version, which is a little bit more delicate, that we use for scraping all the food mess our kids leave on the dining room table. Next is the Ember mug, which I think we've gifted an Ember mug almost half a dozen times now. And we have two in our kitchen. They are fantastic at keeping coffee warm online.

all morning or maybe all day if you're a really slow drinker, and their customer service is fantastic. There are some great Black Friday prices that I'll also link to right now. And for putting it in that cup, you should really check out Trade Coffee. Based on the smile that shows up on Amy's face every time she opens up a package from Trade, I feel confident saying that this would make an amazing gift for any coffee lover. We've gifted it multiple times and

And with every delivery, the recipient's going to get a new curated bag of beans from the top independent roasters around the country. Best of all, you can get your first bag free and up to 30% off at allthehacks.com slash trade. Next is the Zolto Denart Universal Wine Glass.

Now, these glasses are not cheap, but we were gifted a set of them a few years ago and we absolutely love them. I know when you first see the price, it seems absolutely crazy, but I'll link to an article from a skeptical Bon Appetit writer who also agreed, just as we do, that wine really does taste better out of them.

But if you're looking for a gift that's more about cocktails than wine, I definitely want to recommend the Death & Co cocktail books. If you live in New York, you've probably been to Death & Co for a cocktail, but their books look so great on the coffee table, but they are also fantastic recipe guides for making drinks. My favorite is Cocktail Codex, which focuses on six root cocktails you can master that really give you the knowledge to make almost any drink.

And finally in this category is the Paprika app. I know I've mentioned this app multiple times because I think it's the best way to organize recipes and meal planning. However, because it's a bit pricey, I think it could make a great gift. But if you really want to level up that gift, you could actually use it to curate all your favorite recipes and share that export with whoever you gift it to and start them off with an amazing recipe catalog.

And until the end of November, all of their apps are on sale for 40% off. Moving on to the tech and gear category, I'm going to start with standing desks.

With so many of us working from home, it's such a nice luxury to have a standing desk in my home office. And we actually just got one for Amy as well. They used to be very, very expensive, but I'm a big fan of Uplift Desk, which has some reasonably priced options and a Black Friday sale right now. That said, for Amy, we actually just picked up a Trisanti standing desk for even less at Costco, and it is fantastic as well. Next, I want to talk about the Sense Energy Monitor.

After episode 135 on home energy, I was so excited to dive into the data from our sense even more to try to make our home much more efficient. It's a small device that you can attach at your circuit breaker and monitors everything going on in your house and uses a lot of smart detection to identify devices so that you can see how much each device is using.

It's not quite as cool as the Span electrical panel, which has been on my list for years, but given that the Sense is about 1% of the price, I am pretty happy with it right now. And you can get 20% off for Black Friday, which I'll link to in the show notes. Keeping in the theme of smart home, I've played around with a lot of devices over the years, but none have worked more consistently or stood the test of time than our Lutron Casetta light dimmers.

With the Lutron Hub, you can connect them to Apple Home or any other smart home platform, and they just work. They're so reliable. I haven't seen them go on sale, but I still highly recommend them. Last is a new addition to our house from just a few days ago, which is the Samsung Frame TV.

Now, I'm not usually one for really nice, fancy TVs, and the last three or four we bought have all been very inexpensive TCL TVs from Target or Walmart. But last week, we bought a Samsung frame TV, and we love it. Between the matte display and when you get a bezel that isn't black, it really does look like art instead of a TV, which is a really great change for our living room. The Black Friday deals on Samsung's website and all over the internet right now are great, but...

They are even better when you stack them with an employee discount, which you can get if you find someone who has access to many different perk sites like Perks at Work or Perkspot. And even better, you can stack that discount with cash back from Rakuten, which I'll talk about more at the end of this episode.

Oh, and also at Samsung.com, there is a chase offer depending on your card for 15 to 20% off. I think it's only up to about $50, but that stacks as well. So when we got our TV, we got the employee price plus the credit card points plus the racketing cash back.

plus the chase offer brought the whole price for the TV down 40% from regular pricing, which was amazing. If you aren't able to get an employee discount, there is also a great price going on right now at Costco with a few extra perks. Next, I want to talk about headphones, and I'm sure you're all expecting me to be talking about AirPods, but

actually know. I want to talk about shocks, which makes my new favorite wireless headphones for running and any other time when I actually want to be a little bit more aware because they're actually open ear. So you can hear what's going on around you. Or in my case, you can actually just have a conversation with the person you're going on a run with. Amy and I have been using the shocks open run pros and

open fits for almost six months and absolutely love them. Don't get me wrong. I am still a huge fan of the native integration you get when using your AirPods, but anytime I'm doing something active, I prefer shocks, but both shocks and AirPods all have really great Black Friday sales right now that I'll link to.

And on the Apple note, now that we have kids and we're checking bags all the time, I always make sure to keep air tags in all of our checked bags. I haven't needed them, but being able to see where your bags are, see that they made it on your plane, see them at your destination just gives me a lot of comfort. And right now they're on sale for Black Friday as well. Next category is clothes and bags.

I'm going to start with my absolute favorite clothing brand. It's what I wear all the time, and that's Viore. They are ridiculously comfy. Amy and I wear them pretty much every single day. I love the Sunday performance joggers, the tech tees. But the partner I work with at Viore said I absolutely have to check out the range shirt jacket, which I think could make a great gift this year. But honestly, you couldn't go wrong with anything they make, and you can get 20% off at allthehacks.com slash V-U-O-R-I.

Next is the Patagonia Nano Puff Jacket, which has been the go-to jacket for our family. It's incredibly warm, very thin, and packs down to almost nothing so you can take it everywhere. They're also very easy to wash, which helps with kids, and I haven't found a great deal for Black Friday yet, but

Depending on the color you want, you can often find really, really great deals. Next is Stance socks. We've tried a lot of sock brands and some of them seem to always fall apart. But day-to-day use, wear and tear wise, we're huge fans of Stance. They're durable, super comfortable, and come in so many great colors and patterns. They're great stocking stuffers and they have a cyber sale right now for up to 40% off.

Finally, two recommendations from Amy specifically. One is the Arizona Waterproof Birkenstocks. She has a couple pairs of these and the wearability is super versatile. She wears them to the park, the beach, brunch, pool, gardening, running errands, pretty much everywhere. They're waterproof, easy to clean, really comfortable and super budget friendly. She's a big fan and I'm pretty sure we even have a pair for the kids as well.

And last is Dagny Dover bags. I think Amy has given Dagny Dover bags as a gift more than anything else. Her favorites are the Landon Carryall and the Dakota Backpack, though I've seen her give a couple Dagny Dover fanny packs recently. I don't see them on sale right now, but Amy does have a referral link that she would love it if you want to use to get $20 off. That's allthehacks.com slash Dagny Dover. Moving into health and fitness bags.

I know I've mentioned my Aura ring a lot, but it's the one thing that I'm always wearing every single day to track sleep, workouts, heart rate, HRV. The Gen 3 even tracks your blood oxygen levels. I've been trying to partner with Aura for a while. It hasn't happened yet, but I did get them to send me a link for up to $100 off this holiday season, which is at allthehack

Next is a book called Outlive, The Science and Art of Longevity from Peter Attia. I'm a huge fan of Peter's podcast, and I've had this book pre-ordered since the moment it was announced. It is a very long book. You can definitely flip around and find the parts you want to read. But I'm guessing that since we can all agree time is one of our most valuable resources, a book about getting more of that back

seems well worth the read. I totally loved this one. Next is a Henson razor. We actually started working with most of our sponsors after I used and loved their products and then reached out to them. But Henson was a little bit different. They reached out to me and asked if they could be a sponsor. I was a little skeptical. I already had a shaving routine in place.

But after spending a few weeks shaving with a Henson razor on one side and a regular cartridge on the other, I was totally convinced. Not to mention it's a gorgeous razor with blades that only cost three to five dollars a year. So you're actually going to save money. And if you go to all the hacks dot com slash Henson and use the code all the hacks, you'll get two years of blades free with your order.

Next is levels. Now, I learned so much about my metabolic health wearing a continuous glucose monitor from levels and tracking how my blood sugar reacted to different foods that I ended up getting Amy one too, and she thought it was so fascinating. We made a bunch of changes, and thankfully for me, it seems like cinnamon really limits my blood sugar spikes.

So I am partaking in my fair share of cinnamon rolls during the holidays and feeling much better about it. You can get $100 off for Black Friday right now, which I'll link to as well. Next is Hydro Flask. So we have an entire shelf dedicated to our growing supply of these water bottles and use them daily. In fact, we finally just decided to purge all non-Hydro Flask water bottles in the house because these have just become our favorites.

They have great kids and adult sizes with tons of color options, and they're always running sales, but I don't see anything for Black Friday yet. Next, in the family and kids section, I want to start with family stuff. First,

First is StoryWorth. If you've ever wanted to capture all the stories and memories from your loved ones, this makes a great gift. Every week for a year, StoryWorth will email your loved one a single life-related question like, what's the bravest thing you've ever done or the furthest you've traveled? And they get compiled at the end of the year into a hardcover book that you can pass down for generations. And you can get $10 off at allthehacks.com slash StoryWorth. The Aura PhotoFrame is a digital photo frame we've

had in our house for a while, but recently we've given it as a gift to my parents. And I think everyone on Amy's side of the family has one too. And it's so seamless to share photos with everyone that we're constantly passing photos around the family. They also have a Black Friday sale going on, which is great. Next is one of my favorite things to do with family over the holidays, and that is an escape room. I don't have a specific recommendation because it varies a

all around the country or even the world. But Amy and I have probably done 50 of these. And anytime we have family around or we're visiting, we try to find one to do with the family and friends. I highly recommend it if it's not something you do regularly. And if you're looking to find one locally, thanks to Drew and Carrie who sent in a recommendation to use the Morty app.

which has a directory of almost every escape room. But speaking of escape rooms, a friend of mine worked with Neil Patrick Harris to develop this amazing game called Box One that you can use at home. It's a solo one player, I guess, board game. And I don't really know how to explain it.

But anyone you know who likes puzzles or escape rooms will love this. I personally thought it was amazing. The company my friend runs that produced the game is called Theory 11, and they also sell the most beautiful playing cards in the world. You just have to go to their site and see them to understand what I mean. But they have so many collections from Star Wars to Harry Potter, James Bond, Notorious B.I.G., and a lot more.

They make the best stocking stuffers. And Theory 11 also sells an endless supply of amazing and high quality magic tricks if anyone in your family is interested in magic. But if you want box one or the Star Wars playing card box set, you can use the code ALLTHEHACKS23 to get 20% off.

Next is something we've now given to all four of our parents, which is a subscription to Delete.me. As you probably know from listening to this show, it's crazy how many sites sell and share your personal data, and it's a huge pain to get them all to take it down. Delete.me does all of this for you, and it's

Not the sexiest, coolest gift to give someone, but it's so cool to be able to Google all of our parents and not find their information online anymore. You can get 20% off at allthehacks.com slash delete me. In the kids section, I'm going to start with something that our girls wake up every morning and immediately start using, and that's a Tony box.

Just think of a small speaker that has a bunch of characters you can put on top and they start playing stories, but you can also create your own custom stories and upload them to your own custom Tonys. It keeps them entertained for hours. And the best part is it doesn't involve a screen and Black Friday sale is up to 30% off.

Then we have jelly cat stuffed animals. Our girls' favorite little friends are their jelly cat plushies. They're high quality, super soft and huggable. I love the assortment of animals and foods and everything jelly cat makes. I'll link to them in the show notes.

Also, our kids love their little sleepies jammies. These PJs are hands down our girls' favorites. They're made from bamboo viscose, so they're buttery soft, breathable, and stretchy, and last much longer than some standard PJs. They also have a ton of fun prints and colors. They're doing a 30% off sale right now if you use the promo code LS50.

Next is Lovevery. We've had a subscription to Lovevery since our first daughter was born. They make these beautiful, award-winning, Montessori-inspired toys, and they send them in a box to your home every two to three months. All the toys are designed by child development experts. They're well-built and sustainably made. I haven't seen a sale yet. I don't think I've ever gotten a sale. But if you want $20 off your subscription, you can use my referral link, allthehacks.com slash lovevery.com.

Next is one of the coolest stories of a gift on this list, and that is backpacks from 5050 Gear, which are fantastic for going out with the kids. And the reason this is so cool is because one of the founders, Adam, is an All the Hacks listener who actually heard me talk about checking your state's unclaimed money website to see if you're owed anything and ended up finding $5,000.

He used that money to help get this company off the ground. And to say thank you, he created a promo code, AllTheHacks, for anyone listening to get 10% off their order. We have one of these bags and it's become our go-to bag for going out with the kids. Next is a repeat from last year, but I guess that's fair because I've actually had to buy this stroller twice because we left it on the sidewalk and drove off without it.

And that's the Baby Zen Yo-Yo. It's such a good travel stroller. And this is coming from someone, me, who built a spreadsheet to compare over 50 strollers. If you like the toffee color, you can get 20% off right now for Black Friday. Otherwise, I haven't seen another deal yet.

And finally for kids is the Nanit Baby Monitor. You probably need to know someone incredibly well or maybe even be married to them to get them a baby monitor as a gift. But the Nanit is such a great product that I feel like I need to include it on this list. It even has a split screen mode if you want to watch two kids at once. And it's an FSA eligible expense. So if you have FSA dollars to spend before year end, it's a great option. Even better, you can get 30% off for their Black Friday sale right now.

And the last section is on learning. First off, obviously, if anyone in your family or any of your friends or colleagues love to learn, my number one tip is to send them the All the Hacks podcast or newsletter, of course. But if you're a fan of All the Hacks,

But if you're looking for gifts that aren't this podcast, I'm going to start first with the book Die With Zero. And I think anyone listening to this show has heard me mention it many times. And the reason I keep bringing it up is because it had such a huge impact on the way I think about life and money that I felt it had to be on this list.

And it's a book that I've gifted multiple times. Next is Masterclass. I know I could spend hours watching all the classes they have. And I'm confident Masterclass makes a good gift because I actually gave one to my dad last year. There's something for everyone. And you can get two memberships for the price of one right now at allthehacks.com slash masterclass.

Next is the Bucket List Journal. I had Ben Nimpton join me on episode 36 who wrote this book to talk about bucket lists, audacious goals, and living the life you truly want.

And to help people actually achieve those goals, Ben wrote this book, but it's really more of a journal with some inspiration, but a lot of room for you to track your lists, write down some tangible steps you can take towards your goals so you will ultimately achieve them. Next, I actually have three books that I haven't read yet, but that really bubbled up to the top of recommendation lists from this year already.

One is When Breath Becomes Air. Sahil Bloom has now been on the podcast three times, though that third episode has not come out yet. And during our conversations, he said that this was his most gifted book. And while I haven't read it, I trust Sahil's advice so much that I'm putting it on the guide. And hopefully I will share a review as soon as I read it.

Next is Same As Ever, A Guide to What Never Changes by Morgan Housel. I'm a huge fan of Morgan's writing. I loved his last book, Psychology of Money, and I've had a chance to interview him on that book. And it was such a good interview. And it's probably why I'm so excited to read his latest book that came out this month,

I should be having him on the podcast early next year to talk about it. So if reading his new book brings out any questions you want to ask Morgan, please share them with me and I will ask him. And last is a book called 4,000 Weeks.

I recently actually hosted a member discussion for all the Hacks members on the book Die With Zero and that concept of maximizing your net fulfillment instead of your net worth. And one of the top recommendations was to check out the book 4,000 Weeks. So it's on my list as well. I haven't read any of those last three books, so I can't

fully endorse them. But if they look good to you or you're excited about them, they might make some really great gifts. So those are all my recommendations for gifts. I do want to talk about how to save money on anything you're shopping for this holiday season. But first, I'll just remind you again that all the links for everything I just mentioned are in the show notes. They're at allthehacks.com slash gifts.

And using the links in all of those places is a huge way to support us and the show this holiday season. So thanks in advance for doing that.

So when it comes to shopping online, there's three big ways I like to save. One is using cashback portals. I always start at Cashback Monitor to see the best way to earn cashback or points shopping online. For example, there are sometimes places where Rakuten, which is often my default site, doesn't earn as many points as using something like the American Airlines Shopping Portal or another platform.

There are some platforms that get listed on Cashback Monitor that seem to have higher rates than you would think. And once you click into them, you realize, oh, well, I've got to go buy a gift card and I can only buy up to $100. So it's a little complicated.

But in general, Rakuten, TopCashBack, all the credit card and airline portals are all pretty straightforward. But at the end of the day, there's one reason why I love Rakuten more than any other shopping portal, if it has the best rate. And that's because you can take all the cash back and convert it directly to American Express points. So instead of earning 10% back,

you can earn 10 American Express points per dollar. And given that I'm usually able to get anywhere from one and a half all the way up to five cents per point with my Amex points, that takes a 10% cash back to anywhere from 15 to 50% cash back.

So definitely a big fan of cashback with Rakuten. We just used it on that Samsung TV I talked about. And if you haven't signed up for Rakuten, you can actually get $40 free after your first purchase right now using my referral link at allthehacks.com slash Rakuten. Next is finding promo codes and discounts. I feel like it's been pretty difficult nowadays to find working promo codes online, a

A lot of the sites that used to share them now are really sharing these referral links and affiliate links in disguise. And so one, you have to be extra careful here because if you're using a cashback portal, sometimes the links through those portals end up overriding your shopping portal tracking. So you'll want to make sure that you refresh and double check. I will check

Sites like RetailMeNot or tools like Honey to find a promo code. It doesn't work as often. What I now do a lot more often is just ask the live chat on the website if there's a discount. Very often I've found live chat really helpful to be able to get promos or discounts on a shopping card. So you can definitely try that. Another great way to get discounts is just look at all the offers you see from Amex, Chase, CapOne, whatever your card company is. When you log on to any of those banking websites...

You'll be able to add offers to your cards. And sometimes there's offers for things that are totally irrelevant to you and you're not going to be purchasing. But sometimes there's really broad ones like right now, because on Saturday is small business Saturday. Most Amex cards will have a five dollars off, fifty dollars as long as you use your card to buy something from a small business.

But there are so, so many offers in the Amex portal that it can be a little bit hard to manage and sometimes hard to browse. Keep in mind that there are often more offers

then you'll see. So for example, right now on my Amex Platinum, I have 345 offers added to my Amex Platinum card. And one other thing is once you add an offer to one card, you often can't add it to the other card. So when there've been some really, really amazing offers on things that you buy regularly and you wish that you had it on multiple cards so you could use the offer over and over again, the way to get around that is either to try to open it in two windows and click it

at the exact same time, which seems very difficult, or use a product like Card Pointers. Card Pointers is a mobile app to manage all of your credit cards, all of your earning. You don't even have to sync to your banks to use it. But

but they have a browser extension that will auto add all of the offers on Amex and chase to your account without you having to do anything. And best of all, they'll hit the Amex and chase API for all your cards at the same time. So you can actually end up adding those offers to multiple cards at once.

So definitely go in and look at those offers in advance to make sure you're using the right card to get a deal this holiday season. And also on Saturday, definitely make sure that if you're shopping at any local businesses to add that $5 off $50 to get a little extra discount. Finally, the third category is gift cards. Most retailers online don't qualify for any elevated bonus points like you would get for travel or dining or

or groceries. So one tactic I love when I'm buying something from a retailer is buying gift cards for that retailer somewhere where I earn more than two points per dollar. So that could be four points at the grocery store with an Amex Gold or 5% back on Amazon. Or if you have a card that earns a lot of points at gas stations or office supply stores, they often sell gift cards as well.

So those are three tactics for saving money online this holiday season. I really hope that's helpful. And I hope that some of these gifts were helpful. If you have any recommendations, either now or later for other gifts you think would make great addition to this guide, let me know. Some of the things on this list were added because people sent them to me last year. So even though I might not get to share it for another 12 months, I would love to see your recommendations. Or if you have any recommendations,

Also, a lot of these are things that I've already gotten and I'm getting hit up from family for things that I might need for Christmas. So I would love your recommendations if you think there's something I should put on my list as well.

Thank you so much for listening to this bonus episode. If you know anyone that you think would enjoy it, please consider sharing it with them. Or if they're not podcast people, feel free to send them to the online version at allthehacks.com slash gifts. And if you haven't gotten a chance to take the All the Hacks survey yet, it would mean the world to me. You can do that at allthehacks.com slash survey. And we have some amazing prizes for you. Three Viore gift cards, an any day, every day set, and a free round trip ticket on United.

Finally, I just want to say how grateful I am for all of your support this year, which has made it possible for all the hacks to become my full-time endeavor. Thank you so much for listening, reaching out and everything you do. I truly appreciate it. Okay, that's it. I will see you again for another episode tomorrow.