Ensure Your Corporate Gifts Are of the Highest Quality by Choosing Kosher

An estimated 9.6 million people practice kosher customs in the United States today. This makes it important to consider kosher when purchasing unique corporate gifts for colleagues, partners or clients. By looking for a kosher label, you ensure that any recipients who adhere to a kosher diet will be able to enjoy your gift. By choosing kosher, you can also be assured that your gift has obtained a high measure for quality.

Why Select Kosher Business Gifts?

Corporate business gifts should be emblematic of both your company's high standards and the esteem you hold for the recipients. Kosher labeling makes it easy to identify gifts of superior quality and taste. This is due to the rigorous certification processes employed to obtain a kosher label. Kosher product manufacturers are subject to intense scrutiny of their ingredients, processes and facilities in accordance with Jewish dietary laws. It's commonly known that kosher food preparation involves the separation of dishes containing meat, dairy and fish. However, kosher certified foods also generally lack the chemicals and over processing of most packaged foods today. Therefore you can be assured that your gift is healthful, environmentally responsible and deliciously gourmet.

Gourmet Gift Ideas for Executives, Clients, Vendors & Employees

Kosher gifts offer unique, personalized expressions of thanks, holiday cheer or congratulations. Consider these options for your upcoming holiday and celebratory executive giving needs.

1. Smoked Salmon. Treat your executive colleague to a sumptuous gourmet meal at home. Many kosher retailers offer Alaskan smoked salmon elegantly packed in a gift basket with all the trimmings.

2. Gourmet Toffee. Few people can resist a gift of rich, chocolaty toffee. Toffee is a gift the recipient will rave about and is sure to share with the whole family. The nutty confections are also perfect for holiday gift giving. Try Enstrom's almond toffees, available in customizable packaging.

3. Kosher Wine. Contrary to popular belief, not all kosher wines are unappetizing. Over the last 10 years the number of kosher winemakers has increased and the quality of the wine has improved. Award-winning kosher wineries include Barkan (Israel), Herzog Wine Cellars (California) and Covenant (California). Kosher Gift Box offers a broad selection of fine wine gift baskets to suit any taste or occasion.

4. Gourmet Coffee & Tea. Kosher coffees and teas are held to the highest production standards. What hard-working executive could not use a gourmet coffee or tea break? Kosher Cornucopia has a Café Mocha Classic basket; Kosherline offers baskets for coffee and tea lovers alike.

5. Gourmet Fruit Basket. While seemingly commonplace, fruit baskets are among the healthiest and most delicious of custom corporate gifts. Look for attractive gift baskets or boxes that cradle and protect the fruit to ensure it arrives at its destination without a blemish.

6. Cakes. Cakes are pastries everyone can enjoy regardless of which winter holidays they celebrate. Grandpa's Coffee Cakes has both small and large cakes in gift tins ready to ship. The Challah Connection features a kosher gourmet flourless chocolate cake. David's Cookies has delectable cheesecakes and a flat rate on shipping.

7. Customized Corporate Gift Boxes & Tins. Many kosher gift retailers have corporate programs to incorporate your company logo on a range of kosher products, from dried fruit and nuts to rugelah. Customized corporate programs are appropriate for giving to multiple recipients such as your clients, vendors and employees.

Sources:

"American Jews." Wikipedia.com.

Giora Shimoni, "Do All Jews Keep Kosher?" About.com.

Robert Bieselin, "Kosher Wines Find Themselves In A Bountiful Season-The Record Online." KosherWineReport.com.

Written by CC Allison

Edible Kosher Corporate Gifts

Wracking your brain for ideas on kosher gifts you can give in a corporate setting? If so, you are in luck. A variety of companies offer gift items created with the Jewish faith in mind. They are all food items, professional and perfect for workers at different levels of responsibility in the office. Here are three key suggestions.

Enstrom's Almond Toffee Squares. These sweets come in individual bronze packing and a tin. They are crunchy and decadent - just right for a man or woman in middle management who has a sweet tooth. Give them a tin and solidify your working relationship.

Kosherline's Tea and Dream Basket. Have a corporate buddy who can't wait for tea time? Then he or she will fall head over heals for this basket. It includes a variety of flavored teas ranging from apple delight to peppermint. Also, this Kosherline product includes little nibblers like buttermilk cookies, vegetable pate and cranny banany snack mix. Give this basket to the boss or head of your company and get one leg up the corporate ladder.

Challah's Connection's Tin. Get with a program that will both promote good will around the office and the corporate log. What is it? It's the Challah Connection Logo Tin Program. Here's how it works. You select a tin from a variety of colors and sizes, pick a treat to go in them like popcorn, nuts or chocolate and then e-mail a digital photo of your company logo to Challah Connection. Afterward, this gift maker will put it all together and ship it out to your company. Give these tins as gifts to the worker bees in your company at a corporate function or during the holidays. It will make them feel appreciated.

These three kosher gifts are just a few that are right for the corporate office. Visit the makers of each at their Web sites (Enstroms.com, ChallahConnection.com and Kosherline.com) for more ideas. They will help you meet the needs of everyone in your company.

Written by Stephanie Modkins

Making Sure Your Corporate Holiday Gifts Are Kosher

One of the most popular holiday gift ideas now is food. Food makes great gifts, whether as a corporate business gift or as a gift brought for the hostess of a holiday party or for friends and family. However, it is important in today's melting pot society that gifts be kosher -- especially if you know recipients are likely to follow Jewish dietary law.

Kosher Corporate Gifts

More and more, companies are offering gifts to clients and to employees. When looking for a corporate holiday gift idea, food is a great choice. There are wines, candies, dairy products, meat products and other gourmet food items that fall into the category of kosher. As long as you are on the lookout for kosher, it is possible to find a unique corporate gift -- or even custom corporate gifts -- of food that follows Jewish dietary laws.

When choosing food gifts, especially gourmet baskets for corporate gifts, it is a good idea to look for the OU symbol. This is a U encircled by an O. It represents the Orthodox Union and the most stringent definition of kosher. While there are other signs that indicate kosher, such as cRc, Kof-K, Triangle-K and Star-K, these designations may not suffice for all those following a stricter level of dietary law. Therefore, looking for the OU can help you when making decisions.

Another very important note about kosher corporate gifts is that you should not offer meat and dairy in a single gift. This is not kosher. Look for gift baskets that follow dietary laws, and, to be safe, avoid putting together gifts that present a conflict. Some ideas for individual kosher corporate food gifts include such things as toffees (like those offered by Enstrom's), wines (such as those offered by Lavina) and kosher cheese (like those offered through Kosheritalia). Indeed, you could put together a gourmet basket that included candy, wine and cheese.

Food gifts can be a great way to share the holiday spirit. And, if you know people following Jewish dietary law, kosher corporate gifts are the way to go.

Written by Jean Marquit

Kosher Corporate Gifts

Every year companies invest in corporate gifts to give to both their employees and their customers. Corporate gifts typically are either promotional items like mugs with the company logo or food-themed corporate gift baskets containing candies, beverage mixes and sometimes even cheese samplers. While these gifts are great for showing your appreciation to your employees or your customers, you need to make sure the quality of your gift doesn't degrade its intended meaning. One way to ensure the quality of the food items in your corporate gift baskets is to select kosher gifts.

What Does Kosher Mean?

Kosher, in simplest terms, is a food grading system that is designed for segregating foods that are deemed "proper or acceptable," according to the rules set out in the Bible from foods that are prohibited. In order to be certified as kosher, the food items need to meet a rather exhaustive list of rules about the ingredients in the food item and how the food was prepared.

Ingredients that are non-kosher include things like reptile meat, shellfish, insects, pork, eagle meat, rabbit meat, owl meat, sturgeon and catfish. In order for other sources of meat to be certified as kosher they need to have been slaughtered appropriately, which usually means that they were slaughtered in a humane manner. Finally, in order to be considered kosher, the food items can't mix meat and dairy at any stage of their preparation or consumption. For example, a corn chip can be considered non-kosher even though it is made from corn if the manufacturer used animal fat to fry the chips. While the rules for kosher items are complicated, all you have to do is look for certified kosher items, which will be marked with either an OU, Start-K or Start-D on the label, to place in your gift baskets.

Ideas for Kosher Gifts

Kosher gifts solve several corporate gift giving problems. First of all, it ensures that all of your customers or employees will be able to enjoy the holiday gift baskets that you send out. Secondly, it ensures that the items in your corporate gift baskets are high-quality food items.

There are numerous themes that your gourmet baskets for corporate gifts can have. Your first option is to put together corporate gift baskets that have a sweet theme. When shopping for items to put into your sweet kosher gift baskets you can save time by shopping from food manufacturer's who specialize in kosher foods. Enstrom's, for example, is a great kosher sweets manufacturer that produces a great line of kosher-certified sweets, including almond toffees. These sweets not only make a great addition to a sweets-themed gift basket, but they also work well in coffee-themed baskets.

If you are interested in a larger thank you gift then consider putting together gourmet baskets for corporate gifts that contain either gourmet kosher meats or gourmet kosher cheeses and crackers. In order to be considered kosher gifts you can't create a meat and cheese basket. Keep this in mind when selecting your items. For example, to build a kosher meat basket select items like brisket, non-pork sausages, turkey jerkey and non-dairy dipping sauces like mustard or BBQ sauce. For your cheese baskets you can include a sampling of different hard and soft cheeses, a selection of crackers, a cutting block and a cheese cutter or spreader.

Written by Eisla Sebastian