Christmas Genius?Follow

That's a really good idea, Al! The best I've done is gotten some sriracha hot sauce for my boss, because she let me borrow her bottle a few times during the year.

... I figure it'll stay in the fridge here and I'll just use it next year as well

Many do like the Mall here. I guess they don't make money off a generic mall gift card spent in any of the stores or more likely they are greedy bastards and want to make more... I stopped buying mall gift cards.

What? Gift cards are easy money for businesses. They're a genius invention really.

The cost of the card and maintaining the service is entirely negligible. Gift cards do two very important things that businesses desperately want.

They guarantee revenue, since they are generally non-refundable. So a purchase of a $20 dollar gift card is $20 in sales that might not have otherwise occurred. It's the same reason companies encourage consumer to buy in bulk.

Second, and more importantly, it's a source of cash for the company. Having cash advances is a huge benefit for a company, because they can use it to reduce costs by offering advances to suppliers or they can invest it and generate interest.

And lastly--somewhat a minor contribution--people occasionally do not use gift cards, which is almost entirely profit.

I didn't, I'm suggesting that neither of the factors you listed is significant. Well, getting people into the store which is a byproduct of your spend more point is fairly significant. Still there are other huge benefits that deserve consideration.

Edited, Dec 20th 2010 10:25pm by Allegory

That's actually a pretty good idea. I would definitely do that... if people actually gave me presents. *sniff sniff

Since there are no young children in my family anymore, we've stopped doing gifts for all the nieces and nephews and Godchildren, and implemented a $10-20 Yankee swap, so each person only has to buy one gift. Of course, this works well because the gatherings are usually under 20 people.

Of course, my grandmother also does a blind Yankee swap with things she's accumulated over the year, such as credit union beach towels, bungee cords, etc. We do the swap like you normally would, but without unwrapping the gifts until after it's over. It's usually a ton of fun.

Edited, Dec 27th 2010 11:49am by Spoonless

Many companies keep the funds from gift cards in escrow accounts until the value is actually used, so it's not really a cash advance.

That's not a party that's a small riot.

When Ray and I first got married, there was a family get together for my grandmother and the look on his face when he saw all these short tanned people converging on us for kisses, hugs and other signs of familial love was hysterical. And he still didn't meet the entire family.

To this day, after almost 14 years, he still can't remember everyone's names. And it doesn't help that many of us have the same names, but we all carry different nicknames. It's so confusing for him.

I purchased 7 in expectation, gave out 3. Technically only 2, I got hit up by a coworker and a college buddy. The third one went to a long time friend who has always been fluctuating on whether we do gifts or not, but her gift ended up being belated and she had the courtesy to tell me about it, so I spent the gift card on an actual gift for her.

It was a little excessive, but I felt more confident this year. Not being able to return people's affections in any form is a nightmare problem for me, and so this has probably extended my lifespan by ten years.

I guess this is a bad time to mention it, but I love you.

Edited, Dec 31st 2010 8:09pm by Kavekk