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12 Really Unique Gifts for People Who are Tough to Please

By on October 25, 2021

Stumped on what to get that person on your list who seems to already have it all? Looking for something a little less generic and a little more special? Here are some unique gift ideas that are sure to stand out from the rest.

Buy this Gift for Someone Who is Really Into Modern Decoration

Nanoleaf is a company that makes light panels which can be configured into any design as well as any of 16 million color options. No drilling is required (ideal for apartment dwellers) and you can even enable touch options to trigger specific smart home features via HomeKit.

  • MSRP: $199 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: $159

  • Pros: Light Panels are rated up to 25,000 hours (over 1,000 days of 24/7 use), ideal for creative uses, cool addition to kids or gaming room.
  • Cons: Continuing to add panels to your display will significantly increase the price.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for Someone Who Really Loves Their Dog

While the Human DNA fad is still going strong, the Puppy DNA fad has really just started to warm up. The Embark Dog DNA Test Kit tests for more than 250 dog breeds as well as a variety of diseases. Creating a family tree on the site, Embark will show your dog’s family tree all the way back to great-grandparents.

  • MSRP: $199 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: $140

embark-dog-dna

  • Pros: Tests for wolf, coyote, and village dog ancestry, tests for over 160 diseases, provides info on genetic diseases & drug sensitivities.
  • Cons: Longer test time than other brands, typically 2-4 weeks to get results, more expensive than other brands.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for Someone Who Hates Walking

While the hoverboard fad has cooled off somewhat, the Segway has gotten smaller and more affordable over time. The Segway miniLITE is a self balancing personal transporter that’s easier to balance on and provides a smoother ride than other transporters. It pulls 4.5 star out of 5 star reviews on Amazon.

  • MSRP: $399 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: $200

segway

  • Pros: Unique design, easy to balance, 11 mile range, up to 10 miles per hour.
  • Cons: Requires more storage room than traditional hoverboard.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for Someone Who’s a Germaphobe

Featured on Shark Tank a few seasons ago, this device uses UV light to destroy all the microscopic germs living on your smartphone. In addition to that, the PhoneSoap 3 UV sanitizer also charges your phone, ideal for a nightstand. Pop your phone in at night and you will have a fully charged, germ free phone in the morning.

  • MSRP: $60 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: $40

uv-germs

  • Pros: Kills 99.99% of all bacteria on your phone, two charging ports on the back of the device (USB and USB-C), can be used to clean other small items.
  • Cons: Basically the same thing as using a Clorox wipe, a significantly cheaper solution.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for Someone Who Lives on the Ski Slopes

Do you know someone that races up the mountain every weekend to ski or snowboard? They clearly need the Beardski Prospector Ski Mask, a surprisingly well made, waterproof ski mask that offers a thermal fleece neck as well as vented neoprene for the mouth and chin. Attaining a 4.5 out of 5 star rating on Amazon, it gets high marks for comfort and warmth.

  • MSRP: $17 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

beardski-prospector

  • Pros: Unique design, washable and non-flammable, comfortable, keeps your face warm.
  • Cons: May draw lots of attention, one-size-fits-all may be too small for big heads.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for Someone that Loves DIY Projects

Combining the moulding flexibility of play-dough and the strength of silicone rubber, the Sugru Hardware Sealer is a product that can be formed by hand and allowed to set in any form overnight. It also attaches to almost anything, making it ideal for any DIY project.

  • MSRP: $22 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: n/a

Sugru-clay

  • Pros: Simple to use, Unlimited number of uses, extremely strong when set, comes in a variety of colors.
  • Cons: 6-month shelf life, can’t save leftover Sugru, relatively expensive.

Check Price on Amazon

Buy This Gift for the Serious Carnivore

The BBQ Branding Iron is a unique gift option for the meat-loving person who hates things like “vegan bacon” as much as Ron Swanson. The branding iron set comes with every letter of the alphabet so that grillers can sear everyone’s names onto their respective pieces of meat (or just the letters L-A-M-E onto any veggie burger they’re forced to cook).

  • MSRP: $17 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

Unique Gifts name branding in steak

  • Pros: Fun and unique little gift for people who like to grill. Really inexpensive.
  • Cons: I imagine it would be annoying to change out all the little branding letters (especially when the thing is hot).

Check Amazon for BBQ Branding Iron

Buy This Gift for a Board Game Fanatic

Ideal for a dedicated game room or perhaps even a kid’s room (assuming they love word jumbles), the Giant Wall Scrabble board is a massive version of the game that we all grew up with. The large wood tiles are held to the board with magnets. There’s also a chalkboard on the right side of the game board to keep score.

MSRP: $1,200 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

  • Pros: Delightful for parties, large fabric bag stores all the tiles, easily one of the most unique board games in existence.
  • Cons: The price tag is incredibly steep and isn’t easily justified unless the game is adored.

Check Pottery Barn for Wall Scrabble

Buy This Gift for the Beer Connoisseur

Anyone who likes drinking beer will probably already have a collection of pint glasses, but most of them probably don’t have a set of pint glasses with their name on them. The Set of 4 Personalized Pub Glasses from Personal Creations can be customized with the name, state, and date of establishment of your friend or family member’s home bar or basement brewery. Personal Creations also has a bunch of other personalized craft beer/pub gifts; pair any of them with a nice six-pack or growler and you’ve got a great, one-of-a-kind gift.

MSRP: $50 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

uniquegifts_beer

  • Pros: They get great customer reviews on Personal Creations. Pretty reasonable price for a one-of-a-kind/personalized gift.
  • Cons: The logo/graphic can’t be customized, which would make these even more unique. 

Check Red Envelope for Pub Glasses

Buy This Gift for the Totally Unique Hipster

Toms Shoes are already about as hip as you can get. But there’s one way to give them even more hipster cred: making sure no one else will ever have the exact same pair. You can get custom Toms on Etsy for around $100 (about twice the cost of normal Toms). You can get pretty much anything you can think of — from sports teams, to classic art pieces, to Disney characters, to movies, and everything in between — hand-painted on your Toms.

MSRP: N/A | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

uniquegifts_toms

  • Pros: Some of the designs are really awesome and unique. You can get literally anything  you want painted on them if you go with a custom listing.
  • Cons: The hand-painting will make them not great for wearing outdoors or in wet weather. Pretty spendy for a pair of canvas shoes.

Check Etsy for Custom Toms

Buy This Gift for the Book-Loving Child (or Child at Heart)

Books are always a great gift idea for kids, but let’s be honest — they just aren’t all that exciting to open up on Christmas morning. But the collection of pop-up books from Matthew Reinhart can hardly be called books. They are so cool, so unlike any other book you’ve ever seen before, that kids might just get more excited about them than the toys they get.

Titles include Transformers, Encyclopedia Prehistorica Dinosaurs, DC Superheroes, The Chronicles or Narnia, The Jungle Book, and Star Wars: A Pop-Up Guide to the Galaxy (most are currently around $25 on Amazon). I own the Star Wars and Dinosaur books and they are ridiculously awesome and entertaining.

MSRP: $30 | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

star-wars-pop-up-book

  • Pros: Pages are filled with tons of interesting things to open and explore; should keep kids entertained for hours. As (if not more) fun for adults to read.
  • Cons: Not great for younger kids who may rip or destroy the pages if left unsupervised (and $30 is an expensive book to get ripped up!)

Check Amazon for Matthew Reinhart Pop-Up Books

Buy This Gift for the Person Who Doesn’t Need More Stuff

Sometimes, the best gift you can give someone is something that’s not easily wrapped in a box: an experience; a memory. For the person who already has all the “stuff” they want or need, a gift certificate for a night of fun can be a great, unique option. For the creative type, how about one of those “wine and canvas” places (where you learn how to create a painting while getting tipsy on wine)? For the foodie, try cooking classes. Or go crazy and get them skydiving lessons. Groupon has tons of these types of activities and more (check their Occasions section for the best holiday options).

MSRP: N/A | Lowest Price on Ben’s: N/A

Unique Gifts groupon

  • Pros: Groupon has activity vouchers/gift cards to fit many ages and personalities. If you get them something for the two of you to do together, it’s a nice chance to spend time with someone you care about.
  • Cons: No instant gratification (they’ll basically be opening a piece of paper). You might end up having to go sky diving…

Check Groupon for Activity Gift Cards

About Kristin Cook

I'm the Managing Editor for Bensbargains.com. When I'm not hunting for deals online, I enjoy good food, good beer, and Star Wars.

2 Comments

  1. dave_c

    November 22, 2013 at 4:32 pm

    Love the BBQ branding iron… tho’ I wouldn’t turn down vegan bacon!

    Reply

  2. Gram

    November 21, 2013 at 10:55 pm

    All interesting ideas. Those shoes look awesome. I just need a new job to pay for them.

    Reply

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