I just don't fucking get it. There's no upside.
Store specific: Spend 50 bucks on a piece of plastic so that you can now only spend that 50 bucks at one specific place. Not to mention that in order to fully drain the card's balance, you're almost always going to have to pay more than the card has on it. Good luck finding something in the store worth $2.17.
Visa: Spend 60 bucks on a piece of plastic so that you can later spend 50 bucks somewhere. In case you're not familiar with how these work, you basically spend 120% of what the card is actually worth in one way or another. Either there's a $3 fee for each use, or a flat rate you pay when you buy the card itself.
So, why the shit do people buy gift cards? Someone please explain this to me.
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I like receiving certain gift cards, like for Benihana (reminds me to actually go there with friends!) or Mitsuwa, a local Japanese market that I also enjoy. Certain restaurants are fine, but otherwise I typically don't care for gift cards and sometimes ask to trade my parents for money for 'em if I know I won't use it. I really like getting iTunes gift cards though! <3 music