“I really hope my partner will not send me another bunch of flowers this Valentine’s,” says Lucy Koech. “They’re boring, yet he has been sending them every Valentine’s for the past three years that we’ve dated.” Well, it is that time of the year again when cupid turns the town red and among many women, flower gifts are among the gifts being considered too cliché.
In fact, so boring among women have flowers become that the image consultants we spoke to are asking men to stay away from them this Valentine’s. According to Robert Burale, an image consultant with the Nairobi-based RB Company, men should avoid giving their women flowers. “Flowers are too predictable. Avoid them,” he says. A study conducted by Exquisite Gift Baskets in the UK resonates with Robert.
The study reports that only 4 per cent of women would want to receive flowers on Valentine’s Day next Friday. Nonetheless, if the findings of a previous survey by Ipsos Synovate on the gifts Kenyan men give during Valentine’s Day is anything to go by, many Kenyan women will be receiving bunches and bunches of roses.
According to the study, 41 per cent of Kenyan men will buy flowers for their valentine, 28 per cent will surprise their women with new clothes while only 11 per cent of men will take their partners out for dinner.
A spot check on numerous flower shops predictably reveals that orders for flower bouquets have been trickling in. Similarly, assorted gift hampers have been flying off the shelves as Valentine’s Day inches closer in many gift shops. According to Susan Wandia of Wishes Gift Shops located at the Yaya Centre, souvenir mugs, branded picture frames and teddy bears, and cards have been flying off the shelves in the few days leading to Valentine’s.
At Purpink Gift Shop which is adjacent to the Strathmore Business School, orders on chocolate bars, wine, perfume and small teddy gift hampers have been flowing in. “We are receiving huge orders for chocolate and wine gift hampers from men,” says Aryton Bett, the shop owner.
However, these may not be the gifts that women want. Take Lucy for instance. She wishes that at the very least, her partner would get her a dress. “A dress and some really nice shoes would do the trick for me,” she says. “Chocolates bars and wine are an effortless routine.” In an echoing survey of 1,000 women conducted by the UK marketing website NetVoucherCodes, women consider impersonal and inconsiderate gifts like stuffed toys and chocolate bars as effortless gifts.
Moreover, the women in the study list ill-fitting and unflattering panties, cheap perfume and tacky, cheap jewelry, and cuddly toys as some of the gifts they would never wish to receive from their partners on Valentine’s. Locally, 36-year-old Veronicah Munuhe confides receiving an underwear gift a year ago from a colleague who was eyeing her.
“I didn’t like it and found him awkward. I felt too mature for that,” she says. While many men consider lingerie gifts to be the ideal gifts for the women they are dating, women view such gifts as being too sexual. “Why would a man give you an underwear gift if he isn’t trying to bed you?” asks Veronicah. Millie Kegoro is another woman who received a lingerie gift last year. “He brought it over to my place in the evening and asked me to open it. Then he said that he wanted to see how I looked in it.
I refused,” she says, adding that she trashed it away once her man left. “A man who gives me lingerie is telling me that he wants to take me to bed and I hate that,” she says.
Strikingly, while women would want to be spoiled with gifts on Valentine’s, many say that the gifts they get do not resonate with their lives at all. Take Joyce Kui, a 32-year-old public relations officer. Last year, she received a pair of oversized akala shoes from her partner on Valentine’s Day. “He gave me the box at the Ambassadeur bus stop and asked me to open it. I did and everyone burst out laughing. I was irritated beyond measure.” In October, the two lovebirds broke up.
Faustina Achieng’ on the other hand says that her boyfriend has already rolled out an awful Valentine’s Gift for her this year after giving her an ‘Eat-All-You-Can’ hotel gift voucher. “I’ve been excising as I try to cut weight and then he brings me this,” she says. “If it’s all about the thought behind the gift, what does this food voucher imply?”
Although perfumes are a popular gift, Robert cautions that men should not gift them out unless they fully know their women’s taste. “Self-help books are also off limits,” he adds. According to Philomena Kasaya, a 32-year-old marketing executive, an ideal Valentine’s gift for her should be in equal proportion to her worth and class. “Valentine’s Day is a gift to our men to leave a mark. An ideal gift for me would be a trip to Zanzibar or Seychelles, not Mombasa. I can hitch a ride there by myself,” she says.
“Let him not wait till our honeymoon to take me there.” Priscilla Aswani on the other hand says she would want her man to upgrade her car. “Getting new car keys will leave an impression from February 14 onwards. A new ride is something I’ll use and something that will always remind me where and why it came,” she says.
Interestingly, Joyce Kui says she wishes her partner had asked her to meet him at the Ministry of Lands and given her a title deed to a small plot as a gift. “A land would be an accumulative asset that would later be of benefit to our family if we got married,” she says.
Ironically, many men buy Valentine’s gifts to remain on good terms with their women. “It’s a routine that you have to follow even if you don’t know why it exists,” says Daniel Khaemba, 36. Jackson Tanui on the other hand says that a man will only put effort in a gift if he is attempting to woo the lady.
“I will only spend if I am wooing her. If she’s a long time partner, I’ll just make an order and go with what’s available.” A study conducted by Harvard Business School, Boston, resonates with Jackson’s sentiments. According to the study titled ‘I Give, Therefore I Have’, single women are more likely to receive expensive gifts from their male partners than married women are from their married spouses.
“Single men will try to signal their wealth to prospective partners by letting them know that they’re solvent. They’ll tap into women’s longstanding attraction for wealthier men, regardless of their own wealth or lack of it,” says Professor Michael Norton, the study’s lead researcher. 491 people were interviewed in the study.
However, to some women, Valentine’s Day does not carry any meaning. Apparently, these women do not find any emotional or romantic essence in the day. “It does not affect how I view my partner or how I intimately relate with him,” says Maylene Mutisya, 33. Her sentiments are echoed by Verah Anyango, a Nakuru resident.
For the past five years that she and her partner have dated, the two have never celebrated Valentine’s Day. “I cannot remember when I last celebrated Valentine’s Day,” she says. “We just don’t feel like two desperate romantics. This year is no different.”