Explore the new State of Recognition 2026 report

 

Employee Birthdays & holidays

Celebrate festive occasions with style

Automate celebrations, personalize rewards, and ensure no special occasion goes unnoticed—regardless of where your employees are.

Return on recognition

Why celebrate birthdays and holidays at work?

Recognition doesn’t always have to be tied to performance. Celebrating birthdays and holidays offers an easy, reoccurring, and impactful way to show employees they matter. These personal moments deepen engagement and help create a culture of care that resonates far beyond the workplace.

Performance
Stock market trading screen with financial graphs on laptop
69
%
of employees say they would work harder if they felt more appreciated.
69
%
of employees say they would work harder if they felt more appreciated.

It's simple, really: appreciation increases feelings of self-worth and personal value, which helps employees want to put in the effort. And it can be as simple as a "Hey, great work today."

Retention
Factory workers in safety gear discussing project during industrial meeting
31
%
lower turnover in companies with strong recognition programs.
31
%
lower turnover in companies with strong recognition programs.

Appreciation leads to greater loyalty. Why? Because when people feel seen and appreciated through recognition, they feel a stronger connection to their workplace. It's simple psychology.

Satisfaction
Smiling senior professional in blue blazer during office meeting
81
%
of employees believe personalized recognition improves their workplace satisfaction.
81
%
of employees believe personalized recognition improves their workplace satisfaction.

General appreciation is great, but personalized is even better, and it doesn't have to be overwhelming. Automation tools, integrations, and more make it easier than ever.

end-to-end flexibility

Never miss a chance to celebrate

Whether it’s birthdays, national holidays, regional celebrations, or company-centric events, make these meaningful moments unforgettable.

Employee Birthdays

Meaningful birthday recognitions

Skip the generic card—and the hassle. Make every employee birthday celebration feel personal:

  • Celebrate peers in a dedicated birthday feed with custom messages
  • Share birthday shoutouts to Slack or monitors for (optional) company-wide visibility
  • Send points or curated gifts employees will actually love
  • Utilize user profiles to give thoughtful, interest-based gifts

testimonials

What customers are saying

NIBCO
 
 
Awardco has definitely helped us do recognition even better. Recognizing someone you work with, even if you don’t see them every day, has been empowering.
Ashley Martin
President & CEO
BPM
 
 
We use recognition as a tool to motivate and encourage our employees—everyone knows Awardco because we actively use it for any and all incentives for employees.
Monica Delgado
Senior Manager of Total Rewards
Kodiak
 
 
There's plenty of research that shows the compounding impact of how when other people can see recognition, it creates that snowball effect. And so it just makes people work better together. They feel more as part of the team.
Zach Makoutz
Sr. Manager, Category Sales Product
Beckman Coulter
 
 
Change management was a concern when exploring new vendors. However, our leadership, HR, and associates have smoothly transitioned to Awardco, and they appreciate its straightforward and intuitive design, which surpasses the complexities of previous platforms.
Kerie Rogers
HR Operations Leader
The Nest Schools
 
 
Automation is something that is really important for us—we try to automate as much as we can so that we can focus on what's important. And Awardco's automation and integrations have fit in perfectly.
Brittany Madonna
Senior VP of Marketing & Communications
Southern Oregon Head Start
 
 
For us to onboard a staff member, it's probably close to about 5,000 to 6,000 dollars. As a nonprofit, I feel like going to Awardco has been a huge cost-savings advantage.
Amber Lease
Human Resource Director
Children's Nebraska
 
 
Being a nurse, I know that oftentimes it's hard to keep coming back day after day. It often goes without recognition or gratitude, but Sunshine has given us the opportunity to empower our team and our leaders with the ability to recognize others. We're proud to have seen such high engagement from our team members submitting recognitions on the platform.
Madeline Quinn
Employee Experience Manager
Hertz
 
 
Using Awardco has given us the confidence that we've partnered with someone that knows what they're doing. We're not only saving a lot of time, but we're building the confidence of our employees as we express our appreciation to all of them worldwide.
Annasuela Fritz
HR Projects and Recognition Manager
ClickUp
 
 
At ClickUp, we like to recognize employees on their work anniversaries. Awardco makes this infinitely easier by automating the process. Now, employees receive a timely email on the day of their anniversary along with a small gift. It's just one small way we're able to express our gratitude and now we're able to do it without any manual labor on our end.
Deanna Tindell
People Operations Specialist
NIBCO
 
 
We’ve always had some sort of recognition program, but never anything all-inclusive where all associates at every location were engaged in the same program—until Awardco.
Dawn Bloch
Chief People Officer
4Refuel
 
 
It’s really meaningful to see CRPs who are out on the road by themselves, along with employees working from home, still interacting and connecting through the platform. It’s almost like our 4Refuel Facebook—bringing everyone together no matter where they’re working.
Lynne Harkness
VP, People & Culture
Children's Nebraska
 
 
People are busy. It's hard. We have our highest volumes we've ever had with patients. But when people take the time to celebrate one another, then we can really see that hope and that goodness beyond that. And so I really think that why we're successful is because our team cares about one another, and they take the time to recognize one another.
Madeline Quinn
Employee Experience Manager
Lockton
 
 
We used to give everyone a trophy at our annual event. Now, we reward true top performers. Awardco enables smarter, more meaningful recognition and spend.
Melissa York
SVP, Head of People & Culture
 
 
Awardco offers such a clean design, way ahead of its competitors, along with excellent offerings, great analytics, and wonderful customer service.
Anonymous
Designer
 
 
The entire experience, from sourcing and implementation to trouble-shooting and recognition, has been seamless and easy...I love the platform!
Anonymous
HR BP

Celebrate any special day

Make birthdays and holidays stand-out events that employees will love.