You’ve made your lists and you’ve checked them twice. And then there are the other lists that you forgot to check—or didn’t know about!
We’ve all been behind on our holiday shopping before. To help, we’ve put together these gift ideas from North Carolina startups that we’ve previously written about or which have grown out from the ecosystem. There’s something to satisfy everyone on your list, from your foodie friends to those lovely picky people in your life.
(Note that some of these startups are also doing Black Friday or holiday-specific deals, so check them out as soon as you can!)
For Foodies and Beverage Connoisseurs
- Macalat Chocolate Bars use a unique mushroom extract as an alternative to sugar. (2023 feature)
- Bake Eat Love offers subscription kits which teach bakers of all experience levels how to bake a different gourmet dessert each month. Give a kit or a gift card to those aspiring bakers! (2022 feature; Co-Founder and CEO Kristen Baileys is also a former Friday Nooner guest)
- Spring & Mulberry uses dates to sweeten their chocolate bars instead of sugar. Get individual chocolate bars or get them in packaged collections! They are currently offering holiday themed collections. (2022 feature)
- Nuba is a ready-to-drink beverage startup that uses dried hibiscus flowers imported from small farms in Egypt. They offer bottled drinks, packaged hibiscus flowers and, as of recently, chocolate bars. (2022 feature)
- Jabin Beverage Co. creates a Persian sports drink that uses natural ingredients other sports drinks don’t use—such as apple cider vinegar—to support hydration and accelerate recovery after exercise. (2022 feature)
- Mosi Tea sells packaged tea and portable tea infusers for your on-the-go tea enthusiasts. They offer individual products or gift sets. (2021 feature)
- Locally Grown does not offer gift-specific items, but their platform does offer the chance for customers to buy food for those big holiday meals from local farms! (2024 feature)
For Lovers of Any and All Gifts
- Better Made Easy offers curated gifts boxes for corporate or personal gifts, using items from local small businesses. While we haven’t covered Better Made Easy for a feature, they were a corporate gift sponsor for this previous year’s Grep-a-palooza.
- Near is an online services platform dedicated to uplifting resources focused on end-of-life care. They offer anything from planning services to physical care gifts. (2023 feature)
- Made Trade is an e-commerce platform that features ethically sustainable goods from local artisans. They sell everything from clothing to houseware and are currently running a Black Friday sale with up to 70% off sale items and 15% off site-wide. (2023 feature; Made Trade was also a 2023 GrepBeat Startups To Watch pick, and Co-Founder and CEO Cayley Pater was a Friday Nooner guest)
For Those Focused on Wellbeing and Self Care
- Aurganics is a skincare-based wellness startup focused on underrepresented skin tones, with products designed for Black and Brown people. They are currently running a sale on a holiday-specific product called the Holiday Glow Baux, a collaboration between Aurganics and A-Peeling Beauty. (2023 feature)
- TeachMe.To is the “Airbnb for private in-person lessons,” designed to connect instructors to interested students across a broad range of sports and activities. Know someone who wants to get started in a sport, but doesn’t have the means to do it now? Send them a gift card! (2024 feature)
- Fillaree aims to fight both plastic waste and synthetic toxins in bath and cleaning products that are linked to cancer. They offer refillable soap and skincare products, with the option to have bulk refills sent right to your door. (2019 feature)
For Those Who Like New “Things”
- Infinity Portal is a customizable LED display that creates an optical illusion light tunnel that illuminates to what seems like infinity.(2023 feature)
- VIANI watches are unisex, solar-powered watches that also uses Hindi numerals to tell time. (2024 feature)
- Alpacasews sells unique plushies, all designed from the mind of its Founder, Emily Foster. This plushie startup—with products ranging from cats (profits of which will go to a cat rescue charity) to “sprouting cows”—is a viral internet favorite, having amassed over 400,000 followers across all social media platforms. (2024 feature; Emily was also a recent Friday Nooner guest)
- GameFlo helps kids and teenagers learn social-emotional life skills through tabletop games. They currently offer a basketball-themed card game called “Pick Up” that teaches players problem-solving and decision-making skills, which is also available in Target stores. (2023 feature)
- Beeloo uses artificial intelligence to make unique printables that range from coloring sheets to puzzles and mazes. You can either use the printables listed on the website or order their activity books, which are sold on Amazon. (2023 feature)
- Sani creates high-quality clothing—everything from formalwear to loungewear to casual top/bottom sets—inspired by South Asian cultural designs. (2019 feature)
- Woobles is a Duke-grown company that has quickly grown viral for its unique crocheting kits, suitable for any crocheting experience level.
- Dreamipsy creates and offers bedsheets that combine comfortable textiles with therapeutic and herbal elements for a better sleep.(2024 feature)
- Wilmington-based Nuream is traditionally a mattress and sleep product company, but they are now working on a technology that would replace traditional CPAP machines with sensors in pillowcases that can monitor sleep patterns. They are currently running a Black Friday sale where you can save up to $1,200 on a mattress, its base and sheets.
For GrepBeat Lovers
- Check out GrepBeat’s Summer 2024 Triangle Poster, which highlights the tech and startup ecosystem around the Triangle region. It showcases tech companies, universities, incubators and accelerators, VC firms, and plenty of recognizable landmarks from around the area. (2024 story)
- ForeverGrep houses all of GrepBeat’s and our sister companies’ (Primordial Ventures and Jurassic Capital) merchandise. We have everything from quarter-zips and onesies to bucket hats and bottles.
- If you aren’t a part of the GrepBeat Book Club (yet) but want to know what we’ve been reading, boot up some holiday reading with the three books we have read so far.
