The gift needs to be able to come off as a genuine gift so there’s some plausible deniability…
Edit: Just so it’s clear, this is purely hypothetical. I just thought of the idea and thought it would be funny to see what a random person on Lemmy might think. This isn’t a serious request and none of the suggestions will ever actually be used.
At one workplace secret Santa (which I always declined to participate in), one recipient got an empty spherical clamshell with cardboard retainer on which was printed the word “Nothing”, visible through the clamshell. The joke being that it was supposed to be “I didn’t know what to get you, so I got you nothing.”
This was not intended as an insult by the secret Santa, but was taken as one by the recipient who must have spent significantly more on whatever their recipient got.
Only you can judge how your recipient would take such a gift, but if this seems like a good idea to you you can probably find them on sale somewhere. (NB: I accept no responsibility if you choose this course of action.)
If I remember correctly, one of the recipients of a better gift thought it was funny so swapped their gift with it to cheer up the unhappy recipient. I am not sure if the swapper was their secret Santa or not.
There had been much offence, pouting and sulking… from a grown man.
I did a thing once where everyone brought a gift and some game was played and if you won your round you got to pick the gift you got, or something like that.
The person who picked before me got 2 crisp $100 bills, the person after me got airpods. I got… A painted rock, I was so excited. It was the only gift that someone put actual effort into and wasn’t just a quick buy.
Not that I would’ve been upset with $200 but I still have that rock sitting in my garden
Dang that’s crazy, someone put a lot of effort into earning $200 and giving it away as well.