Cheap Gifts for 200 People

• Give your 200 friends freshly baked cookies. chocolate chip cookies image by Scott Slattery from Fotolia.com

  If you're throwing a large event for 200 people, you've probably already allocated most of your budget to the venue, the food and the drinks. Many people expect party favors, or small gifts, when they attend large-scale events, but for 200 people, the costs of those gifts can add up quickly.

Decoration Gifts

• Make your party's decorations do double-duty as gifts for each of the 200 people in attendance. You could give your guests the floral arrangements from each table. Set a single bloom in a small, $1 vase in front of each table setting, and each guest can take home both the vase and the flower. For this idea, you can also use candles instead of flowers, or you could create personalized place mats that guests can take with them when they leave.

Food Gifts

• Food gifts are an inexpensive option for a huge number of recipients. Often, you can give each guest something you've cooked, baked or at least packaged yourself for under $1 per gift, and sometimes for far less. Brownies, chocolate chip cookies and homemade dessert bars won't break apart during transport, and you can package them cheaply in cellophane. Close the cellophane with an event-appropriate sticker to add a little more flair to your food gift. You could also put colored, candy-coated chocolates in clear favor boxes, or you could give out small baskets with samples of local honey or cheeses. Avoid including nuts in any of your recipes, since some people on your extensive list may be severely allergic to them.

Empty Picture Frames

• If you've hired a professional photographer for the event, you've already made an investment in photographing everyone there. You can stretch this investment by making it a part of your gifts for guests. Book a photographer that will post the prints online, and find out in advance the web address for the posted photos. Print up 200 small cards with the web address and the date the photographer will post the photos. You can slip each card inside an inexpensive but attractive frame, and give each one to a guest. Craft stores and bargain stores sell a variety of inexpensive frames. Once the photographer posts the photos, your guests can print out a copy to use in their frames. Make sure you tell your photographer in advance that you want at least one image of every guest.