A Treat-First Dog Gift Guide for the Weekend After Thanksgiving

Our freeze-dried treats are still the first thing we put in Ella's stocking, and the weekend after Thanksgiving is when we start actually buying things instead of just thinking about them. This treat-first dog gift guide for the weekend after Thanksgiving is the one we keep coming back to, no urgency, just what is actually worth putting under the tree this year.

Treats first

If you only buy one thing, buy the treats. Everything else on this list is nice, but a rotating supply of single-ingredient treats is what actually gets used every single day, long after the wrapping paper is gone and the tree is back in a box in the garage.

Modified Monthly is our subscription box, a rotating set of treats that shows up on its own so you are not the one remembering to reorder in January. A Build Your Own Dog Gift Box lets you pick the flavors yourself, and a Filled Dog Christmas Stocking is the closest thing we sell to a done-for-you gift, already assembled by the time it ships.

The advent calendar

The 12 Days of Sniffmas Dog Treat Advent Calendar is the other thing people ask us about every year once December gets close. It is treats, one small door at a time, and it tends to sell through its own schedule rather than ours, so it is worth deciding on early instead of late if you want one under the tree in time.

We like it for the same reason we like Modified Monthly. It spreads a gift out over weeks instead of one morning, which for a dog means the excitement does not end when the paper does. Ella does not understand the concept of a calendar, but she has figured out that a certain drawer in the kitchen opens once a day in December, and she is there for it every single time.

None of this is complicated. A door opens, a treat comes out, the day moves on. It is one of the few gifts on this list that turns into a small daily habit instead of a single moment on one morning, which is part of why it keeps coming back onto the list every year without us having to think too hard about it.

From the shop

• Modified Monthly
• 12 Days of Sniffmas Advent Calendar
• Build Your Own Dog Gift Box
• Filled Dog Christmas Stocking
• Buying for more than one dog, our bundles cover that without turning into four separate orders.

Beyond the treat aisle

Once the treats are handled, the rest of the Christmas shop is where we keep the extras: a hoodie or a circle-logo t-shirt for the person doing the shopping, a magnet or a die-cut sticker of Ella and the Camaro for the car, a stocking for the person on your list who also collects car merchandise without admitting it. None of it is required. All of it has ended up in someone's cart the last two years running, usually added after the treats, never before.

How we actually build the list

We do not sit down and design a gift guide from scratch every year. We look at what is already sitting in the shop, ask which of it actually gets reordered, and start there. Treats always come first because Ella goes through them year round regardless of the calendar, gift or no gift. A t-shirt gets worn once for a photo and then folded into a drawer. A bag of turkey heart gets opened the same afternoon it arrives.

The order matters more than people expect. A stocking with treats we already know a dog likes lands better than a toy picked at random, and a subscription box beats a one-time purchase for the simple reason that it keeps showing up long after the last string of lights comes down in January. That is really the whole logic behind this list, treats first, everything else second, nothing bought just because it was on a shelf.

Questions

Is the advent calendar available right after Thanksgiving?

We open it up as soon as the Christmas shop goes live for the season. If the listing notes a pre-order window, that note is the accurate one, not anything written here, so check the product page before you plan around it.

Can I mix flavors in the gift box?

Yes, that is the point of building your own. Pick what the dog on your list actually eats rather than guessing, especially if you know they already have a favorite.

Do you run any Black Friday pricing?

We are not going to promise anything here that is not already on the product page. Check our Thanksgiving page for whatever is current before you order, rather than taking our word for it in a blog post written weeks in advance.

For the rest of what we make and sell year round, see Explore.