by Kirsty O'Lone

Created on: November 17, 2010

Many people spend more than they would like to on their Christmas shopping, it is all too easy to get caught up in the excitement of the season and spend more than you would like to. However there are some simple things you can do to save money on gifts and other Christmas expenses.

The first thing you should do is make a budget and stick to it, figure out exactly how much you can afford to spend on Christmas as a whole and then decide what you will spend on gifts and what you will spend on other Christmas items. If you are planning on buying new decorations for example, make sure to include these in your budget. You may find it useful to figure out how much you are going to spend on each person, perhaps you and your partner are going to set a limit on how much you are going to spend on each other, if so factor this into your budget as it may just give you more free cash to spend elsewhere.

If your workmates are planning on buying presents for each other you will feel that you have to get them gifts as well, in these financial times everyone is wanting to save money so perhaps setting a limit on the amount you can spend on each other is a good idea. Your workmates will not think you are cheap to suggest this as it is merely a way of keeping everything fair on everyone else, after all not everyone has the same budget and it would be unfair to make someone feel bad if they could not afford a big expensive present for everyone.

An even better idea for the office is to organise a secret Santa, this is not at all difficult you just need someone to organise it. You simply get pieces of paper and write the names of everyone on a piece, fold the paper and put them all in a hat or bowl. Each person picks out a name from the hat and they buy a gift for that person, again you can set a limit on how much is to be spent. This way each person is only buying one gift, and each person receives a gift bought just for them.

If you have lots of friends you can take advantage of ‘mix and match’ offers, many big chain stores do these for a variety of gift sets. By using these offers you can often get three gifts for the price of two or a similar offer, but because they are mix and match you don’t have to get three people the same thing. These offers are particularly good for your group of girlfriends as they usually have a vast range of perfume or make up gift sets.

When it comes to your close family you will naturally want to get them something a bit special,

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