Ask her friends is run by Ben.
He has this to say:
“Buying a gift for someone special should be one of the most natural things in the world, right? So why when we try to get something for our wife, girlfriend, sister, friend or mum is it such a struggle – with countless hours of searching, browsing and agonising?”
I can certainly empathise with that problem situation.
He explains:
“The way I see it there are 3 KEY problems:
- A lack of ideas of what to get. Where do I actually start?
- Lots of ideas but no clue as to what to go for! The agony of choice!
- Will she like it? Will she hate it? Fear!”
With a novel method of crowd sourcing ideas from women, Ask Her Friends has chosen to feature items that those of us who have pretty normal lives would actually like to receive.
Having things that women would want, rather than some design board decide what they will give us to choose from, gives us a better choice, and more confidence that any gift we spend our hard earned money and time on getting and sending will be well received with a smile, rather than a tolerating grimace while the receiver mentally plans who to give that to next year.
There’s a lovely ideas map that asks you questions to get to the best choices for a gift and tailored to the person you are buying for.
With a limited range, the quality of goods on offer is higher than I expected. As part of my trial of the service, I chose to try out the Jimmy Choo perfume.
It’s definitely the only Jimmy Choo product that I am likely to wear. As much as I love shoes, I am way past the ability to wear skyscrapers and not break my legs on the way down and it was really good to get something that I really really wanted.
The fact that my kids have said that the smell is beautiful just made my day even more. My scent came with a gorgeous Jimmy Choo Make-Up bag and I think the perfume is now going to be used in preference to any I have on my bathroom shelf.
If you’re struggling to choose, even with all the advice you can get, there is an online live chat facility which is always a good customer service selling point.
Give them a whirl, you might just find what you’ve been looking for.
Hmm. I just had a go on the ideas map for me and I can safely say it didn’t really work. I prefer the method of writing down names then writing down stuff I know about them, hobbies, interests, quirks. Then I buy according to that. I’m normally seen as a pretty good present buyer but there was nothing all that unusual in there as far as I can see.
Some good feedback for the site, I’ll pass it onto them.