My family knows that I don’t like to give cash as gifts. As my nieces and nephews grew into teenagers cash was all they asked for at Christmas and birthdays. My message back to them was, no, tell me something you need, want or would like to do and I will buy you tickets or a gift card to fill that request. It took a few years to get my message across. But as we live in more and more abundance, exchanging cash just seemed mindless. Gift giving is a more thoughtful art than just here’s ten bucks don’t blow it all on in-App purchases. As I’ve shared before, I enjoy the process of thinking of the other person and choosing something they wouldn’t buy themselves or that they really, really want.

I will buy gift cards though. Although I learned recently you can’t purchase a Visa gift card with a debit card. But anyway, gift cards treat the recipient to a night out at the movies, a trip to a museum or perhaps a small shopping spree at their favorite store.

Lately, gift card companies are making it harder to look generous. Gift cards for a specific product or store now have ranges on them for the amounts you can load. This no doubt is a cost and space saving idea. But the ranges they are packaging really can make Aunt KK look cheap. There is a huge difference between $15 and $250, or $25 to $500. So let’s say you usually spend about $25 on a birthday gift. If you buy the Amazon card that allows for $25 – $500 and you only put $25 on it, how cheap do you look? My message to these big companies is fine put a range, but give me space to look generous, please.

Your thoughts,

KK