Dog walking, cleaning and childcare top Christmas lists in Sussex this year yet we will still bin up to 136,000 rolls of wrapping paper over the holiday season.

A recent survey in Hastings revealed that the majority of adults would prefer to receive ‘help’ rather than a gift this Christmas.

The survey, conducted by Hastings Adventure Golf, revealed that three quarters of those polled said help with dog walking, gardening, babysitting or cleaning is the gift they would prefer to receive this Christmas.

Despite this, 51 percent said that they generally gift in excess of 20 presents at Christmas, with a further 14 per cent gifting in excess of 40 presents. Almost half of respondents said they have no intention of cutting back on the number of presents they buy this year, with almost nine in ten people (87 per cent) intending to give wrapped gifts, in paper with sellotape.

As a result, Sussex residents will bin up to 136,000 rolls of wrapping paper over the holiday season and around four black bags of gift packaging per household. Nationally that’s 108 million rolls of wrapping paper going to landfill.

Given this, its unsurprising that half of those surveyed agreed that their household generated more waste last Christmas than could fit in their bins.

Hastings Adventure Golf has now launched its Naked Christmas campaign to encourage the reduction of  wrapping. The Naked Christmas campaign is hoping to persuade people to give unwrapped gifts this Christmas and help make the festive season less waste producing.

Simon Tompkins of Hastings Adventure Golf said: “The figures associated with Christmas gift wrapping are astounding. By running this campaign we are hoping to highlight the astounding levels of needless waste and associated landfill costs of using wrapping paper, while outlining ways of solving the situation by giving ‘naked’ or unwrapped gifts. This one small effort alone can make a massive difference. Gift vouchers for experiences or home made vouchers that gift your help make a great alternative.”

Tips on cutting back on the use of packaging and wrapping this Christmas, include:

• Don’t wrap gifts  – you can explain to the recipient why
• If you need to wrap  – choose your wrapping paper carefully. Not all paper is recyclable and before recycling remove any sticky tape and decorations such as ribbons and bows as these cannot be recycled.
• Gift someone your time instead of a present – make your own gift vouchers for babysitting, dog walking, gardening, cleaning.
• Think about vouchers for an experience – these create fun memories – plus the bonus of no waste, no packaging.

For more helpful tips on having a Naked Christmas visit:
www.hastingadventuregolf.com/christmas

Hastings Adventure Golf offers a range of gift vouchers to include family packages of golf and fish & chips.

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