Recycled Six Pack Gift Basket Container

Making a gift basket from a six pack beer or soda holder is a great way to recycle and provide a festive container for treats and gifts. Homemade treats and other small gifts are fun to use when making gift baskets for neighbors and friends, but often, it can be challenging to find a basket or container to hold them. Paper plates can bend easily and look unorganized, and often, baskets or other containers are much more expensive than the gifts they're meant to hold. A recycled six pack holder is a cute and unique twist on gift basket gift giving. This six pack gift basket container will make a cute set out of any collection of treats and goodies.

To replicate my gift basket you will need:
One cardboard six pack holder (Negra Modelo brand)
Burnt Umber Acrylic Paint
Foam Paint Brush
Natural colored tissue paper
Cardstock and a graphics program for printing side decals
Curling Ribbon in Red and Green
Glue Dots or adhesive of choice

Start by painting your holder on all sides with the brown paint. It took me several coats to fully cover the printing and graphics on the box. I used about six to seven coats, but acrylic paint dries quickly, so it didn't take too long. I just painted a coat on as I remembered throughout the day, and soon had it covered.

After the paint has completely dried, pack up the treats and gifts, using the tissue paper to lift them to the right height in their sections and add puffs of color.

My side decals are seven inches by two and a half inches. I used Photo Shop Essentials to design them, then printed them and cut them out. To attach them to the sides of the box, I used glue dots, since they stick so well to vertical surfaces right away, and are permanent.

Tie curling ribbon about thirty inches long through the handle hole and to the side of the top flap. Curl it up to allow it to cascade decoratively around the sides of the six pack gift basket container.

There are many variations on this project as well. I used the Negra Modelo brand boxes because their bottles are wider than most, and therefore the sections in the holder are bigger. I needed this extra room because I was packing pint jars into my gift boxes. If room for smaller items or half-pint jars are all that's needed, the regular sizes of most brands would work just as well.

I used brown paint because I had a lot left from another project and I had tan tissue paper, so I thought that would coordinate well. Also, the boxes were brown to begin with, so it was easier to cover all the printing on the box. Any color can be used of course, though I'd recommend darker colors, since light colors will take very many more coats to cover all the slick surface of the boxes.

The signs on the sides of the six pack gift basket container could be made from traditional scrapbook materials, drawn and colored, or even painted on with different acrylic paints.

The possibilities of personalizing this very useful gift box are endless, and I had so much fun making them. I hope you will too!