Can?t-miss gifts that will make your boss smile

Shopping for bosses who appear to have everything can seem like a chore. Yet, businesses in the area have plenty of gift ideas that show your boss how much you appreciate him or her. For managers who love to golf, Doug Cook, director of golf at Flatirons Golf Course in Boulder, recommends reusable supplies but warns that if they are avid players, the supplies they use are highly personal.

To figure out what brand and type of ball they like to use, or their glove size, he suggests doing some research by calling his or her spouse or friends for guidance.

Golf instruction is another possible gift, but Cook adds that lessons can be a sensitive topic with some.

?Sometimes it implies they aren?t good golfers, but if they golf, everyone knows they can use lessons to improve,? he says. Individual lessons at Flatirons Golf Course in Boulder cost $35 for 30 minutes.

If the boss likes to entertain, Peppercorn in Boulder offers a variety of savory food items, including mustards from Stonewall Kitchen in flavors such as margarita, martini and sun-dried tomato, $5.95 each. Peppercorn also has tasty pineapple and peach salsas, $5.95 each, from D.L. Jardines, that can be pulled together into a customized gift basket.

Other items to consider are wine glass charms in themes such as musical instruments, grapes, shoes and sports. There are six charms to a box, which range from $19.95 to $25. To accompany wine charms, Peppercorn offers Alessi corkscrews from $45 to $85 in fun and functional designs such as little people. The head and arms are chrome to stay bright and ageless. The body contains a Teflon corkscrew.

?You have to see these (corkscrews) to appreciate them,? Kim West, sales associate, says. ?These are gifts that have a ton of personality.?

In lieu of wine gadgetry, another gift for the boss with seemingly everything is a gift of wine or mead from a local winery. Redstone Meadery in Boulder has a variety of different flavors of mead fermented from honey available from its Web site, www.redstonemeadery.com, or through 200 businesses in Colorado.

For a sparkling honey wine, David Myers, chairman of the mead, recommends Black Raspberry Nectar, $15 for a one-liter size, which has the mouth feel and texture of beer and the light taste of a lower alcohol beverage. For a noncarbonated honey wine, Myers suggests the Traditional Mountain Honey Wine for $23, which has citrus overtones and goes well with Thai food and roasted turkey.

For dessert wine, Redstone offers a Red Raspberry Reserve for $50 that blends the tastes of honey and fruit.

Special for the holidays, Redstone also has a Vanilla Beans and Cinnamon Sticks Mountain Honey Wine for $25 that can be served at room temperature or over ice in a tumbler. To sample the wines before selecing a gift, Redstone offers on-site tours and tastings.

With many bosses, long hours and stress go with the territory. For some, unwinding with a massage can seem like a gift from the heavens. At spas such as Tapestry & IV Seasons, with locations in Louisville and Boulder, massages are provided in a number of different formats.

Tension relief
In addition to traditional massages, Tapestry offers raindrop therapy for $80, which combines massage, accupressure, reflexology, American Indian healing techniques and aromatherapy that uses therapeutic-grade essential oils. Another option through Tapestry is aromatherapy massage for $70, which incorporates therapeutic massage with essential oils for a total rejuvenation of body and mind.

At the Colorado Massage Center in Boulder, whirlpool and sauna use is complementary prior to any in-house service, including massages and face or body glows.

With a $45 face glow , the boss will be pampered with a 30-minute series of cleansers, toners and moisturizers. The body glow, which costs $50, is a 45-minute body scrub that uses natural sea salt, corn meal or sugar mixed with aromatherapy to massage over the body to cleanse, detoxify and exfoliate the skin.

Another option at the Colorado Massage Center is the essential oil body wrap for $100. It encourages the release of toxins, stimulation of the lymph system and regulation of the nervous system. With the 90-minute wrap, the Colorado Massage Center uses wheat germ oil with essential oils of pine, lavender, juniper, thyme, mint and sage.

For managers who enjoy a spot of tea, the Tea Spot in Boulder is the place to stop. The Tea Spot, which opened in November 2003, blends its own teas and recently introduced a tea line for health and fitness.

One tea included within this line is Meditative Mind, which combines white and green teas with jasmine floral essence and rosebuds to sharpen the mind and awaken the senses. Another new tea is Zen-Cha, which is an herbal-scented green tea that promotes focus and awareness.
The Tea Spot sells single ounces of teas for $3.29 to $5.99, depending on the variety. Four-ounces of teas are available for $5 to $40.

To pull together a tea gift basket, Karen Harbour, partner with the Tea Spot, recommends including a gaiwan, $10.95, which is a single teacup brewer with an eight-ounce porcelain cup and porcelain infuser. The Tea Spot also sells decorative tins to package gifts of tea blends.
For bosses who have a passion for their home state, Colorado in a Basket in Louisville, www.coloradobaskets.com, has a number of baskets that feature Colorado manufacturers of munchies, spicy jellies, fruity jams and sweets of all kinds.

Tracy Boland, who runs the business with her mother, Frances Schneider, highlights three baskets as a possible fit for the boss who has few needs.

For chocoholics and coffee enthusiasts, Boland suggests The Denver Brew for $35, which offers items such as melt-away mints, chocolate mint cookies, chocolate espresso beans and assorted Colorado coffees in a ceramic columbine or chili pepper mug.

For bosses who love their protein, The Bighorn at $52 includes buffalo sausage and elk sticks as well as other goodies such as butter toffee pretzels and smoked cheeses. For managers who suffer from stress, Boland recommends The Stress Buster, $33, which has a stress ball, body massager, chocolate aspirin and herbal tea.

?We can customize a basket to fit any person?s needs at any price,? Boland says. ?We have fishing, golf, tennis, hiking and sports-themed baskets as well.?

And finally, while books are a popular gift for the holidays, the trick with bosses is to know which ones they already have. For literature that will help to keep bosses focused on the positive, Jill Stearns at Lighthouse Books in Boulder suggests ?The Trick to Money is Having Some? by Stuart Wild and ?The Power of Intention: Learning to Co-Create Your World Your Way ? by Wayne Dyer.

on Facebook on LinkedIn