Idea - Lovehoney Sexy Secret Santa!

With thoughts of what to get my Mrs for Christmas rattling round my head I suddenly had this idea!

For anyone not familiar normal secret santa involves colleagues putting names in a hat then you draw one at random and that's who you have to get a gift for and the other person does or doesn't ( depending on how you play ) get to know who bought it. Often a workplace will agree on a budget limit at the start.

I wondered if LH could assist us in doing something similar. My thinking was that anyone wanting to play would put a few things on their public wishlist of say less than £10-20 in value. Then LH sends you an email to tell you who you are Sexy Santa to and you buy them one of their gifts.

I'd like it so that this could be done without emailing in so that people can keep their details private.

What do you think Lovehoney? Could you do this? What do users think of the idea?

If this is old hat then sorry but I got myself rather excited with the idea!

Perhaps it could be gift wrapped with a little note like ' Have very naughty Christmas - from your Secret Santa!'

Sounds like a good idea, but I cannot take part in it, as I am simply out of the UK and in country with postage So the main problem would be that you would have to ask people to say they want to take part,and separate them from those who are out of UK, as relatively lot of members here would not be eligable to take part in it, due to postage.

Mmm hadn't though of that. Wouldn't be nice to exclude people. Maybe LH could think of some deal?

LH did take postage off from some countries, like Australie, but several of us are in Europe countries with postage... Or Canada, which is the same, with postage. So you would have to separate people off, it would not be fair to get someone in country with postage.

Edit: or maybe not so many really active members here, but you would have to exclude some here for sure. Think majority of the major contributors are in UK or in countries without postage, but some are not.

Rather than exclude people, how about only doing for people who wish to take part?

Instead of putting stuff in your public wishlist, create a new wishlist (like you do for Orgasm Army if you wish to do reviews) Call it "Secret Santa". LH could then randomly pair up people who created this list by the deadline.

I think this has sort of happened in previous years, but in a lot less organised way. I think the amount was less than a fiver, and people bought gifts for those they wanted to, so not quite the same but similar... There's a 21page thread on it, which have forgotten to link (sorry)

Think it would have to be a low amount of money for people to want to take part, and am not sure Lh would have the time to organise it, so might have to figure a different way around it if you wanted something more formal?

Personally I don't even want to think about Christmas yet, lol...

Indeed excluding people isn't really the ethos of the OA.

Yes I suppose that could work too. I'm not that familiar with the wishlist system yet.

Maybe LH just makes it clear that it's luck of the draw if you get someone international and that it's randomly done. Then if you opt to do it you accept there may be say upto an extra £5 on top delivery charge.

This is the kind of stuff LH would need to figure out.

I think being Christmas they should waiver the delivery costs if there weren't many outside the free delivery zone. Go on :-)

I was thinking random you see so that everyone taking part gets something. If you leave it upto individuals then some folks may get several whilst other get little to none.

Just trying to be fair especially to newcomers who haven't formed online friends here as yet.

Well, with your system, you would have to exclude internationals, as it would not be fair. Hate to say it but delivery starts at £5 and goes up from there! So it would be organisation problem, as you simply have to make a system where you exclude people in the system and pair the rest who have selected items in certain range.

And yes, some people might have gotten a lot, and newbies likely would be in disadvantage, but I guess no system is fair. Apart from publically announcing who will be buying to whom and leave the choice to them what to buy.

Any idea how much the postage might be for a single item, Laveila? Would it eat up the whole amount? Or maybe you could minimize it by putting light weight things on your wishlist, like stockings and lingerie? A gift card would be perfect, does LH do them?

I think it's a great idea, but my main concern would be 'enforcement'. If it's open to everyone (which it has to be) there wouldn't be any way to make sure everyone sent their gift unless someone from LH was willing to do it manually - which would be a lot of extra work. Maybe we decide to just take our chances with that?

Yep. single item is £5 for non tracked and £10 for tracked, number of items does not matter. You can have 10 toys in 1 package and pay the lower postage for untracked.

I think I would leave it for chances. That way you know the postage will be free and everyone would be willing to buy if they enter.

Also a bit of problem is the fact that in LH register there are hundreds of people who never contribute here and I doubt they would buy a small present to anyone here.

That's why Lovehoney wishlists might work well as you wouldn't have to post it yourself and if that was the case people would have to disclose your address which would limit the involvement a lot.

Perhaps you could have an option somewhere to say 'how much you like to give?' and then they could pair up like minded spenders. Not everyone would necessary go for the lowest price.

Wish I'd posted this tommorow when there would be some LH staff to chip in.

You can use wishlist, you just sign on the threat made for the purpose saying you want to take part in it and make a wishlist and people choose what they want to buy you under the selected maximum price. Thats how it was done last year I believe. Yes, someone may end up with 10items, another with none, but thats the risk.

But I think it should be made clear that people who are eligable for free postage should apply only unless someone is really willing to buy someone who is in another country, but then he can go and buy it from the wishlist directly of the person.

what if everyone who wanted to take part in the uk made a xmas pressie wishlist or a secret santa wishlist with items they would like on it, someone can buy that person a present and they that person then has to buy them one in exchange.

obviously it wouldn't be secret then but still- no one is left out, anyone that doesn't want to take part doesn't have to and lovehoney doesn't have the extra work of pairing people up over the busy xmas time.

we could start a xmas pressie thread so that people can be aware who has bought for who.