Retiring? A Gift Registry May Be in Your Future

No longer are registries created exclusively for engaged couples, newlyweds and expectant parents. Today they're drawn up for a variety of celebrations and ceremonies: birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, holidays and housewarmings. Even kitchen remodels.

Big transitions trigger registries, too, such as when young adults head to college or former couples pick up the pieces after a divorce. One person even registered at Crate & Barrel in Los Angeles after the city was hit by the 1994 earthquake, a story in the New York Times said. Stores large and small offer registries.

Judy Sears, 70, looks out to Payette Lake in Idaho, where she will paddle with the Hobie kayak given her as a group gift for her recent retirement.

Courtesy of Halley Shultz

Many registries in one place

MyRegistry.com in Fort Lee, New Jersey, is a universal gift-registry platform that works with hundreds of stores, including the REI Co-op. Sue Miller, 64, a senior vice president, says its service lets consumers sync gift registries set up at multiple stores, and lets anybody with a smartphone turn it into a bar code scanner to add new items, from virtually any store.

Explaining the value of registries, Miller observes: “People are much happier if you show you listen to them, and give them what they want, versus what you think they want. Because it's not about you. It's about them."

Nontraditional registries, like those for retirees, represent a small but growing market segment, she says.

From city life to beach life

Consider Carolyn, 63, who retired from journalism and with her husband decamped from the East Coast to Cape Canaveral, Florida. She's mulling a retirement registry to decorate their beach condo and equip their new RV with plastic cookware and accessories for the grill. Carolyn, who asked that her last name not be used, says if she draws up a registry it would be for the benefit of their two children so they know exactly what they want for their birthdays, Mother's Day, Father's Day and Christmas.

Retirement is the “perfect time to have a registry, because if you've been married a long time, everything is sort of worn out, like your towels,” Carolyn says. “And who doesn't want a new, spiffy set of kitchen tools?"

"A lot of people change their living situation when they retire and go from a three-bedroom, two-bath house in the suburbs in Minnesota,” she adds, “and they move to Florida, where it's a whole different decor, a whole different lifestyle."

Wondering about etiquette?

What's the proper etiquette? Rule out requesting a Tesla or Tiffany & Co. sterling — it's bad form to suggest that friends break their banks, especially if they're pinching pennies or facing difficulties.

Bed, Bath & Beyond, which has retirement registries, suggests on its web site a beach chair, wine bottle opener and electric fondue pot as possible gifts.

Catherine Newman, who pens the “Modern Manners” column for Real Simple magazine, sees nothing impolite about asking for lawn chairs or a bottle opener since that's “stuff to make the transition to leisure more fun.”

Newman, who lives in Amherst, Massachusetts, says if a person truly needs something — “money, stuff, care; it is never tacky to ask."

As for retirement, she notes: “I'd be more inclined to throw a party for all your nearest and dearest — assuming such a thing can happen again — and if folks bring you gifts, great."

Prefer to bring a gift? Consider asking retirees, or their loved ones, what they'd like, since some will covet a motorcycle helmet and others, a hammock.