This Christmas, shoppers and consumers are willing to spend more — even as prices for the holidays continue to surge. Retail sales are expected to grow between 8.5% and 10.5% this year compared with 2020, to a record of up to $859 billion. While this is great news for most stores, the holidays put a lot of pressure on people for gift-giving. It’s hard to think about buying great presents (within budget) for the people in your life.
For poker lovers you know, there are a lot of popular and affordable gifts related to the game. Poker accessories might just strike you as interesting ideas, unlikely to be duplicates. There’s also the common notion that poker produces great “guy gifts” (even if the game is by no means exclusive to men). But what are some of the specific gifts in this category, and what should you know about them? Read on for some thoughts on the subject.
Poker Chips
It may be that the best gift you can give to a poker player — or even someone you might suspect would be interested in getting into the game — is a set of poker chips. The game is simply better with chips, and a great case of them can become a go-to accessory for a decade or more. A standard poker chip set comes in white, red, blue, green, and black denominations.
The only thing we’d note is that quality matters a great deal. You’ll find plenty of cheap plastic poker chips that frankly aren’t worthwhile as gifts. The better options are typically made of clay, ceramic, harder plastic, or even occasionally wood or metal. For that matter, there are even 3D-printed chips these days that can be made out of durable hybrid materials. Just avoid the cheap plastic and you’ll be on the right track.
Cards
Cards make for a fairly simple gift, but they can be a very nice one as well. This is because, as with chips, there’s a pretty big range of quality concerning playing cards. Basic packs tend to be nice enough, but they’re inexpensive and unspectacular. On the other hand, just a little bit of research will turn up a lot of artistic, high-quality alternatives that many treat as collector items. And best of all, most of these are pretty affordable as well, until you get into the really rare stuff (of which sometimes only 1,000 packs or less were ever made).
A Poker Table
A poker table or table topper is a little bit more of an investment. But you may be surprised how many of them actually come in the $50 to $200 range. Whatever the prices, a table or topper can make for an excellent gift for any regular player, because it’s simply better to play the game on a surface that’s meant for it. If nothing else, the felt top makes it easier to move cards and chips, and establishes a little bit of a casino atmosphere.
Be careful with the markings on the surface, which in some cases aren’t aligned with basic poker rules. For instance, a table designed for Texas Hold’em may have designated spots for each player to have two cards — but not for the four cards each player is dealt in Omaha poker, or for that matter the three or five dealt out in various “stud” or “draw” games. This isn’t a huge issue, or even a particularly common one, but you should be mindful of the markings when selecting a table, and find one that’s as versatile as possible.
Film Posters
This idea more or less speaks for itself — but just to be clear, we’re talking about gifting posters from the best poker films that have come out over the years. Different types of art can show your appreciation of someone — think of how Google Doodle thanked frontline workers during the pandemic — and how much you understand the game they love. Of course, you need to know the space available to the recipient, and whether or not there’s room for decorations (let alone whether the posters will fit in). Provided this kind of consideration though, a set of nice, framed poker film posters can be a great gift. Anyone with a poker or game room will like the opportunity to hang a few of these up.
You must be logged in to post a comment.