Swag Bag Season

One good thing and one very bad.

Maybe because the world is crashing around us in bits and pieces or maybe it’s because I no longer have to think about awards show season for work, but I forgot about the Grammy Awards — out of all the awards shows, it is clearly the best, due to musical performances and questionable wardrobe choices and such. I was reminded of the fact that they’re just around the corner by this delightfully horrifying and very informative piece detailing every single thing in the $30,000 gift bags that will be assembled by an army of beleaguered interns and offered to performers and presenters at the show.

Here’s everything inside the $30,000 Grammys gift bag

Gift bags are 70 percent crap, but sometimes there are gems, buried deep within the rubble. You’d expect that a gift bag presented to Famouses at the Grammys would have a different ratio, but I am pleased to report that you’re wrong. Everything in this bag, save for one to two items that I would gladly snatch from the waiting hands of the poor soul tasked with distribution, is very expensive junk. Let’s take a closer look.

The best gift by far, aside from the tinted Chapstick, is a week-long stay at the Golden Door Spa in California, valued at $8,850. Poking around the spa’s website for a few minutes leads me to believe that once you’re there, the $8,850 is just for the privilege of staying at the spa and not for any of the various spa treatments, etc. I would gladly root around in the gift bag and take only this, but I imagine celebrities already have the means to purchase this for themselves, but I understand the nature of advertising. Someone paid money to put this thing in the bag and so it goes.

The worst item by far are still the most intriguing. Here is the BeBib, marketed as an “adult bib,” meant for protecting your custom Givenchy from makeup fallout as your glam squad contours your face into submission.

I appreciate the utility of this item and the ingenuity of its inventors, but paying $38 for a piece of fabric that you drape over the clothes you’re already wearing feels like a complicated solution for a very simple problem: if you’re worried you’re going to get bronzer on the fancy shirt you’re wearing, do like the women’s magazines tell you and wear a robe. Dressing gowns were invented for this purpose! Don’t buy a BeBib, but if you do, use it for eating spaghetti instead.

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