How to Properly Gift Wrap a Present in 13 Seconds
Even once you’ve crossed everybody off your holiday shopping list, the gift-giving is not complete. There is one final step: The wrap.
Whether your wrapping style is simple envelope corners, elaborate ribbon curls, or newspaper held together with duct tape, you’re wrapping your presents wrong.
How wrong? Very wrong.
If it takes more than 15 seconds to wrap a box, you have failed. According to video evidence, employees at Takashimaya Department Store in Japan can wrap a present in 13 seconds flat. Study this video, commit it to memory and then prepare to feel like an elf as you whiz through hundreds of presents in no time flat.
Need to see that again in slow motion?
The Japanese Gift Wrap takes basic origami technique and puts it to commercial use. The wrap allows present-givers to cover their present neatly and efficiently: The technique requires less paper, less tape and less time.
But just bear in mind that if you’re flying home for the holidays, you should consider wrapping presents after your arrive: Even though wrapped packages are technically allowed in both check-in and carry-on luggage, if there’s something suspicious inside, TSA will rip open your Japanese gift wrap much quicker than 13 seconds.
