About 10 years ago, we started a tradition we call Quarterly Christmas.
The idea is simple: once per quarter, we send every employee a gift. Sometimes it is a digital gift card. Sometimes it is a physical item we order and mail from Amazon or another retailer. Sometimes it is company swag, like t-shirts, hoodies, mugs, or other branded items.
The physical gifts are often the most fun because there is a little surprise-and-delight moment when something arrives in the mail. It feels less transactional than a bonus or gift card, and more like an actual present.
Christmas creates a sense of anticipation, generosity, and joy. We wanted to bring a little bit of that feeling into the rest of the year.
Quarterly Christmas is not meant to be complicated or expensive. The point is to create a recurring moment where employees feel appreciated, remembered, and included.
For remote teams especially, small rituals matter. When people are not sharing an office, you have fewer natural opportunities for connection. A quarterly gift gives the team a shared experience, even if everyone is in different cities or countries.
Here is a simple version you can use:
Quarterly Christmas works because it is predictable, positive, and easy to understand. Employees know that every few months, the company will do something nice for them.
That consistency builds trust. It also reinforces a simple message: “We appreciate you, and we are thinking about you.”
The gifts do not need to be extravagant. A thoughtful $25 gift can create more goodwill than an expensive but impersonal perk.
Quarterly Christmas works especially well for virtual and remote teams. When employees are spread across different cities, countries, or time zones, small shared rituals help create connection and belonging.
For a virtual Quarterly Christmas, you can send each employee a gift once per quarter and then bring the team together online for a short celebration. The gift could be a digital gift card, a snack box, company swag, a book, a desk accessory, or a physical item shipped directly to each person’s home.
To make the experience more memorable, encourage employees to open their gifts together during a video call. You can also add a few simple activities, like holiday-style trivia, show-and-tell, team shoutouts, or a quick round of appreciation where teammates recognize each other’s work from the past quarter.
The goal is not to recreate a full holiday party every three months. Instead, virtual Quarterly Christmas gives remote employees a recurring moment of surprise, appreciation, and shared joy.
At our company, Quarterly Christmas is part of a broader approach to taking care of the team.
For example, in Q4 we run a lot of holiday parties for clients, which makes it one of our busiest seasons. After that push, we do a “dark week” between Christmas and New Year’s to give the team time off and space to recover.
Together, these practices help create a healthier rhythm: celebrate the team during the year, work hard during busy seasons, and then create real rest afterward.
Quarterly Christmas is a small practice, but it can have an outsized impact on morale.
Set a budget, choose a cadence, and start simple. Whether you send a gift card, a box of snacks, or a company hoodie, the real value is in the ritual itself.
Done consistently, Quarterly Christmas becomes more than a perk. It becomes part of your culture.
Next, read about how to host a successful virtual holiday party.
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