Client gifting that gives back: how Private Vista reimagined year-end appreciation

A 40-person wealth management company traded 1,200 hand-signed cards for a client-choice program — and landed somewhere more meaningful.

For years, the gift was wine. When the Private Vista team sat down last holiday season to rethink their client appreciation program, Nicole Young — the company's Senior Marketing Manager — kept circling the same problem.

"We had been sending wine year after year — more out of tradition than intention. Many of our clients didn't drink, many didn't like red wine. We kept asking ourselves: what do you get for clients who seem to have everything and don't need another branded water bottle?"

That question led Private Vista to Gifts for Good.

 Through the Gifts for Good platform, Private Vista's clients chose gifts that gave back — and the impact added up quickly. The program funded 1,353 weeks of clean water and sanitation for communities in need, provided 8,954 meals to children in need in the USA, and gave 2,095 hours of care to rescue animals in no-kill shelters.

Every gift, chosen by the client who received it.

It wasn't the numbers. It was how personal the response felt. Clients didn't just appreciate the gesture, they were moved by it. "Clients told us they didn't need anything and were so grateful for the opportunity to give back. Many loved it so much they said they'll be doing their family gift-giving through Gifts for Good for the foreseeable future."

For Nicole, who leads marketing at a 40-person company full of nonprofit board members, the appeal was a tension she'd never been able to solve: choosing just one cause. “What drew us to Gifts for Good was that we did not have to pick just one organization. I saw the amount we were spending on gifts and I knew we could be doing more with that budget. Getting to gift, give back, and provide our clients agency over how that money is spent — that was precisely what I was looking for.”

There was another benefit in the form of a huge time save. Where the team used to hand-sign more than 1,200 cards, double-check addresses, and chase returned packages, the new program gave their advisors back real time during the busiest stretch of the year.

Asked what she'd tell another company still gift-shopping the old way, Nicole points to three things:

“It would be hard not to want to do a campaign after hearing all of those experiences and anecdotes.”

In a year when most client gifts get filed under "nice but forgotten," Private Vista's gave their clients something to talk about — and a budget that went much further than wine.