We all enjoy Christmas at the best of times, but after the last couple of years, everyone needs a party even more than usual. To help your team reconnect and be inspired for the year to come, it’s time for a special experience. We’ve put together our top 10 corporate Christmas party ideas so you can farewell 2021 and welcome 2022.
We’ve included options for companies big and small, local and national. Budget or extravagant. In-person, online or hybrid events. The important thing is to match the event to the culture of your company and your team. Give them an experience to remember, so they’re inspired and motivated long into the New Year.
1. Bluey Family Christmas Party
This will resonate straight away with mums and dads, so if that’s your team, go for it!
Hold the party in a park. Bring the kids. Play all the Aussie yard games. Backyard cricket. Trampolines. Celebrate one of the best shows to come out of Australia in recent years.
How do you make it ‘Bluey’ and not just a family fun day?
· Get everyone to bring their dogs.
· Have blue and white decorations
· Have Bluey and Bingo themed bonbons and crackers
2. Virtual ‘Exposure’ Christmas Party
If you can’t get the team together in person, you need to make the virtual Christmas party really fun. This one requires a little preparation!
Before the event, email all your team asking for some information other people can guess about them. A celebrity they’ve met. Dream holiday location. Craziest thing they’ve ever done. You choose what you need to know.
On the day itself, put the CEO and other managers on the spot.
· Ask them to guess the right answer, either with no hints or from multiple choice options.
· Run a challenge between different managers to see who knows the team best.
· Then turn the challenge around and get the team to see what they know about their CEO and other senior executives.
You can also send all your team a gift box (Read last months blog on Gift Box) beforehand – something they won’t open until the event. Obviously it’s Christmas-themed – nuts, chocolate, a Santa hat. Integrate with the event by opening certain things at certain times.
3. Virtual Christmas Cocktail Class
This is another event where you send a gift box in advance. Then you can all get together online to make and enjoy Christmas cocktail drinks.
Try some red ones:
· Kir Royale
· Strawberry Daiquiri
· Negroni
· Bloody Mary
And some green ones:
· Midori Sour
· Grasshopper
· Mojito
Have a professional bartender lead the team in the making. (Check out the guys from Kubarz)
Use your company cheer (or come up with one) to toast before you taste each one.
Have a vote to decide which cocktail is best. Or share them all on screen and vote the best-looking one!
Just one note – if you’re are going with this theme, make sure you also cater to any non-alcohol drinkers in your team. There are plenty of mocktail recipes out there and they can still join in the fun.
4. The Hybrid Christmas Dance-Off
This is for national companies with staff across the country, who can’t all get together.
There’s an in-person event in the city where the head office is, but everyone else is invited to join via virtual platform of your choice for a part of that event.
· Everyone – attending in real life or online – should dress up in cocktail dress to make it a special occasion.
· Send all online attendees an Uber Eats voucher so they can have dinner on the company.
· Send them some party props too – these don’t have to be expensive. Poppers, sparkly glasses, Santa hats. Just something to help them get into the mood.
· Have big screens at the in-person event so that the people Zooming in are visible.
· When the dancing at the venue starts, lead off with some simple team moves - hand waving or rolling – and get everyone online to join in. Have shout-outs and prizes for the best performers.
Depending on the regulations in your state, your live partygoers may have to dance at table rather than on a dance floor. Or they may have to stay sitting down. Work with it. Make it funny.
And don’t expect your online guests to stay the whole time. Half an hour of virtual dancing is more than enough. But the food, dressing up and the props will make them feel a part of the main event.
5. Traditional Christmas Dinner with a Twist
The most traditional of all our ideas is an in-person dinner. Serve a full traditional Christmas spread – with a twist. Vegan ham.
The important thing is, you don’t tell anyone what the twist is until afterwards. If you want to raise the stakes, you can tell them there’s something non-traditional about the meal and get them to guess what it is, but don’t tell them.
Add a Kris Kringle too, but to put a twist on that, give it a specific theme:
· Your gift must be office stationery.
· Your gift should be something from your dream holiday destination.
6. Corporate Christmas Picnic Party
This is another in-person event, but this time it’s a picnic style, informal meal. It could be lunch, afternoon or even dinner.
Give the picnic a theme. You could pick a corporate theme, or choose a movie or series.
· A Bridgerton theme would allow lots of dressing up and parasols. Cucumber sandwiches and croquet.
· Squid Games, on the other hand, is all tracksuits and tugs of war.
7. Christmas Champagne Breakfast
A champagne breakfast is a great way to mix up the corporate Christmas party.
Champagne and sparkling wines are very affordable these days – and since it’s still morning most people won’t drink a lot. They’ll be more interested in bacon or croissants. Or for a touch of luxury serve strawberries – they go really well with champagne.
Add some red napkins and shortbread shaped like Christmas trees to jazz up the Christmas theme a bit.
8. Paint and Sip Brunch
In a classic ‘paint and sip’, participants bring their own wine to enjoy while they’re trying to copy the masterpiece in front of them. Mix things up a little for a memorable corporate Christmas party.
· Replace the wine with champagne. Not only does it work better in the morning, it adds a special sparkle to any event!
· Serve delicious brunch boxes to everyone in the team.
· Ask the team to dress up and award prizes for the best dressed, closest to theme, most inventive and so on.
9. HQ Christmas Light Bonanza
Does your business have a large warehouse or car park? Go wild with the Christmas lights in this space (blow the grid!) then use it as a focus for your corporate Christmas celebration.
If your team aren’t back at the office yet, or you don’t have the space to get them all together, invite everyone to drop by and admire the lights – then have gifts and goodies to hand out. Make sure they know the family are invited, and make sure you have extra gifts for family members.
· Get different departments to decorate different areas and have a competition
· Add cardboard cutouts of team members or senior management
· Have a huge welcome sign saying how much you look forward to seeing everyone in 2022.
You will need to coordinate the time people arrive. Depending on your state, your venue and regulations, people may be able to get out of the car and wander around, or they may just have to drive through. But if they’ve hardly been in the office for the last two years, this is a great way to get them re-engaged.
10. Food Truck Christmas Party
If you don’t have a central space you can decorate, consider a food truck Christmas party.
· Hire a food truck and decorate it with your corporate brand or logo
· Set up a schedule to visit all the LGAs where your employees live
· Hand out tacos or pizza or other food from the truck.
· Have a photo booth close by so all your team can take photos.
In essence, you’re having lots of smaller outdoor parties. You’re also putting yourself out for your team. They don’t come to you – you go to them. A great way to build goodwill.
This is also a great solution if many of your staff are nervous about getting together in large numbers.
Depending on the size of your company and the number of LGAs you need to visit, you could do this in one night, or you could spread it over a week. If you’re a very large corporate, you might even do this for an hour every weeknight in December, right up to Christmas. Tailor it to what works for you.
There you have it. Ten ways you can turn your Christmas party from every day to exceptional. Some of them might sound like a lot of work, but if you need help making them happen, we’d love to talk. Or if you’ve got something even more spectacular in mind, tell us about it!
Whatever you do, let’s all look forward to fun times over the festive season.