The Gift of the Year winners for 2021 have been revealed.
The winners and highly commended products in the 2021 Gift of the Year competition have been announced in a series of virtual events held during Spring Fair @ Home.
Each category had its own top secret zoom celebration to announce the winners, as well as an additional special live event on Tuesday afternoon to announce the Judges Choice winner and the first People’s Choice winner.
Go La La took out the Judges Choice Award with their Filthy Gorgeous Soap Range, as well as the Novelty category. While Blue Eyed Sun picked up the People’s Choice Award for their Bio Loco Loop Water Bottles, taking out the prize after an impressive 6000 public votes were cast in the competition. Blue Eyed Sun also won in the Contemporary Gift, Ethical Gift, Kitchen & Dining and Own Label categories.
The Filthy Gorgeous soap range from Go La La was created as a fun B2C project during the first lockdown and quickly went on to become something of a hit with the company’s trade customers.
After promoting the funny bars on social media, Go La La found increased contact from shop buyers wanting to stock their humour product despite the difficult trading circumstances.
Go La La Co-founder, Laura Kavanagh said, “Buyers recognised the great credentials of these bars; ethical and natural to which we applied our irreverent brand of humour. They really are uplifting in every sense!â€
Other Gift of the Year category winners include Message In A Bottle Pop Up Card from All Joy Designs in Cards & Wrap, Bookworm Booklights from the Thinking Gifts Company Limited in Stationery, Birthday in a Box from Craft + Crumb in Under £15, Richard Osman’s House of Games from Hacche Retail in Branded Gift, and Rainbow Heroes in Aid of Samaritans Charity Jigsaw Puzzle from Gibsons in the Commemorative, Collectable and charitable category. Gibsons also won the Festive & Occasions category for their Christmas Around the World Jigsaw Puzzle Advent Calendar.
Chris Workman from the GA said, “From what has been a very different competition this year we have certainly seen a resilient industry, and an industry that has grown, adapted and thrived even in testing times. It has been great to see so many fantastic products entered and congratulations to all the Winners, Highly Commended, Shortlisted and everyone who entered. You are all winners in our eyes, we hope to see you all next year as we plan to grow the competition again to be even bigger and better.â€
To see the full list of winners, visit the Gift of the Year website www.giftoftheyear.co.uk/categories
