The Funny Farewell Gift

and how to get away with it!

Don't you love giving a funny farewell gift?
There is nothing more wonderful than the look of surprise and laughter when people unwrap one!

It's fun thinking up humorous gift ideas! Especially when circumstances force you to be creative!

We at the fond-farewell.com have often used humour to give going away gifts - mainly because

we were trapped in a mining camp with no way of accessing an appropriate gift in time, or
the work colleague was only at the company a short time.

In all these cases the send-off was very informal or impromptu, which are the only times desperate/bad gifts are acceptable. So bad they're hilarious.

We've learned that all you need with a funny goodbye gift is a show of effort, and a clean sense of humour.

Signatures are a nice touch and a nod to sincerity, and if the farewell gift is really weird or random, a presentation should explain the joke.

A goodbye present that is given with such humour and affection in a really positive farewell speech means you can usually get away with a bad joke.

Example Funny Gifts

Random idea:

Hey! What's all that junk in the back of that library?
Dust off that weird framed photo of some guy on a cliff, and put signatures all over it and voila! Instant gift!

Explanation:

A group of us at an exploration site did this to Dan, our fieldy, as we felt it was the most appropriate and hilariously unappealing thing.
We wrapped it in old newspaper tied it together with a rubber band as we had no sticky tape but we really wanted it to look budget anyway.
During the farewell speech we made up some story linking the picture to him...and random gift explained!

Random idea:

Hey! What about that pink ceramic cockatoo in the kitchen?
Can we use it to give to Jodie? Sign it and voila!
Instant sentimental present that will remind her of the workplace.

And she can't leave it here or throw it away because it has all of our sentimental signatures on it, everybody wins!

Explanation:

During the presentation we called it an "award" for being the Only Senior Field Assistant in 2008! Random gift explained!

Check out more real-life joke gifts.

More Funny Goodbye Gift Ideas

Choose an inappropriate card - like a Grandmother's Day card, or one of those obnoxious singing Christmas cards.
Put together several kitschy gifts like chocolate medals to attach to a hairy chest, a gorilla mask, and a singing fish toy, and make them link together in your farewell presentation.
How about a t-shirt made with an alternate job title on it (e.g. Security)? Have people sign it, before presenting it to the person leaving, wishing them luck in their next job.

People love to have a laugh at themselves when they are the centre of sincere affectionate attention.

Just remember!

Funny farewell gifts like this are best given unwrapped or explained as part of a presentation, rather than leaving it for people to try to understand why they got such a weird/terrible present.

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