Ebooks are becoming more and more popular.  They’re typically inexpensive (relative to print books); they’re available any time of the day or night, and they take up almost no space.  So, although many of us still prefer good, old-fashioned paper-and-ink books, ebooks have their place – and some books are only available digitally!

But if you want to give one as a gift, what do you do?  Well, there are some options.  Of course if you’re in a time crunch you can order an ebook and just forward it in an email to the recipient.  But that’s not a lot of fun!  A nicer option is to put the ebook on a disk, and present the disk along with some tangible item that logically corresponds.

This can be fancy or expensive, of course, but it doesn’t have to be!  If you’re giving a PDF of recipe binder printables, for instance, you could give an empty binder along with it.

A Few Examples

The current Ultimate Healthy Living Bundle is a good example.  You can buy a whole bundle for someone.  Or you can buy one and break it up – give one whole category to a particular person.  Or break it up even further and give gifts by topic.  (You can really stretch your “bundle budget” this way!)

The bonuses in the bundle even provide some tangible items that can be paired with ebooks from the bundle, for no “outside” expense (except shipping).  For instance:

Use the Joyful Giraffe gift certificate to purchase a sun hat, and pair it with Repelled, for a fun-in-the-sun gift.

Since the Joyful Giraffe bonus is a gift certificate, you can use it for different things, depending on your needs/preferences, so there are a variety of combinations you could do.  Another baby option would be to buy a cloth diaper with your certificate and package it with Confessions of a Cloth Diaper Convert.

Or if you don’t need a baby gift, how about a package of Econuts detergent and one or more of the Green Cleaning ebooks?

Cultures for Health is offering a free yogurt or sourdough starter.  So you can pair the starter (there’s even at least one gluten-less option!) with one or more of the cookbooks that include sourdough bread. 

Here’s a fun pairing!  MadeOn has two products in the bundle: a bonus sampler of their skin care products and My Buttered Life, their book about how to make the very same skin care products!  (Well, I’m not certain if the flavors are exactly the same, but the base recipes are.)  So give the two together as a gift, and your recipient will be able to see firsthand what she can make as a result of using the book!

The Sweetbottoms bonus lends itself to a couple different combinations, depending on whether you choose an adult bracelet or a baby bracelet.  A baby bracelet might pair nicely, for instance, with Confessions of a Cloth Diaper Convert or Crash Course in Natural Parenting.  Here, though, I’ve opted to pair an adult bracelet with Easy Beauty Recipes, for a beauty/style-themed gift.

Use your Strawesome credit to pick up some smoothie straws to go with Smoothie Secretes Revealed and/or The 30-Day Green Smoothie Challenge.  (Check the clearance section to get more bang for your buck.  The selection varies.)

ALL of these are options that use only parts and pieces from the bundle itself (included books and bonuses)! Of course the options increase considerably if you expand beyond that, and throw your own “tangibles” into the mix.

Give Essentials of Essential Oils and/or the Essential Oils & Natural Health ecourse together with a bottle or a small set of essential oils.  (Remember that if you buy your bundle through my links you stand a chance of getting that free, too.)

Pair Nourishing Cookies for a Healthy Holiday with a cookie cutter or cookie cutter set.

Present The Granola Book or Will Forage for Soup (and/or Beyond Broth) in a pretty soup bowl.

Give The Everything Beans Book with a layered jar of dried beans.

Package any of the personal care recipe books with the ingredients for one of the recipes it contains.

Give Herbal Preparations and Applications and/or Making Herbs Simple with a mortar and pestle.

It’s a bit off the beaten path (and not for just any recipient!) but you could even give the chicken-care books along with a handful of chicks or pullets!

What About Copyright?

Now, some of you are wondering about copyright.  Thank you for being conscientious!  With the occasional exception for books that are intended for classroom use or some such (and say so), generally each purchase of an ebook entitles one person to have it.  In other words, it’s a single copy, just like when you buy a printed book.  You don’t buy a book and then copy it to pass out to ten of your closest friends.  🙂  If you want to give a friend a copy, you buy a second copy.

Ebooks work the same way.  You are welcome to buy an ebook and give it to a friend if you aren’t reading it or keeping it.  So if, for instance, there are books in this bundle that you won’t use, you are free to pass them on.  (Then just delete them from your own computer, please.)  If you want to keep them and give them away, you’ll need to purchase a second (or third, or whatever, as appropriate) copy – either by purchasing additional bundles, or just buying additional copies of individual books (whatever meets your needs).