I agree that it's shittier (from an ease-of-use perspective), but I don't agree that it's more crass. The usual objection to cash or cash-equivalent gifts is that they're impersonal and show that you don't know the recipient well enough to pick a gift they'd like, or care enough to expend the effort to find one.
A gift card (at least if it isn't something generic like Amazon or Starbucks) at least says "I wasn't sure what to get you, but I know you like X-type things, and store Y is all about X-type things, so here's a gift card for store Y". I think this sort of thing can work well for hobbies where a gift-giver might not be able to reasonably choose what to get. Like, for example, I wouldn't mind a gift card to a hobbyist electronics store like Adafruit, but, given the nature of the things I buy there, I would never expect any of my friends (or even my girlfriend) to know what I'd find useful from there without asking me for a specific thing to get for me, which would ruin any amount of surprise. But on receiving that gift card, I'd think it was a nice surprise, and very thoughtful that they remembered that time I was talking about how I bought an ESP32 dev board and was playing around with some electronics projects.
But yeah, if someone gave me an Amazon gift card, I would find that as thoughtless as cash (fortunately still easy to use, since I buy things from Amazon all the time, and I can easily just add the gift card to my account and then not worry about it anymore). And if someone gave me a Starbucks gift card, they clearly do not know me at all, as I don't drink coffee.
Again, totally agree that gift cards are worse than cash from a usability perspective, but I think they're less crass. You might be unhappy to receive a gift card, but there are many people who would fell warmer and fuzzier receiving a (thoughtfully-selected) gift card, rather than cash.
> And the principle of it is that the cash they could have given you is now earning the retailer interest?
As the article says, vanishingly few retailers make interest or investment returns off gift card money. Nearly all of them consider it working capital and use it to help run their businesses.
Either way, I find this to be a weird objection. A gift is about the giver and the receiver. If a third party makes interest off some unrelated side transaction, it's kinda petty to be worked up about it.
I will give you that gift cards can be used to signal they noticed you like a certain type of thing, but a gift card to Amazon or Target does not do that.
If you really do not know what the other person would like as a gift, and do not want to do cash, a regular phone calls
I think is more meaningful. I want for almost nothing except home cooked food that would be given as a gift, but just calling and spending a few min to say hello and update on happenings in your life is much preferred.
A gift card (at least if it isn't something generic like Amazon or Starbucks) at least says "I wasn't sure what to get you, but I know you like X-type things, and store Y is all about X-type things, so here's a gift card for store Y". I think this sort of thing can work well for hobbies where a gift-giver might not be able to reasonably choose what to get. Like, for example, I wouldn't mind a gift card to a hobbyist electronics store like Adafruit, but, given the nature of the things I buy there, I would never expect any of my friends (or even my girlfriend) to know what I'd find useful from there without asking me for a specific thing to get for me, which would ruin any amount of surprise. But on receiving that gift card, I'd think it was a nice surprise, and very thoughtful that they remembered that time I was talking about how I bought an ESP32 dev board and was playing around with some electronics projects.
But yeah, if someone gave me an Amazon gift card, I would find that as thoughtless as cash (fortunately still easy to use, since I buy things from Amazon all the time, and I can easily just add the gift card to my account and then not worry about it anymore). And if someone gave me a Starbucks gift card, they clearly do not know me at all, as I don't drink coffee.
Again, totally agree that gift cards are worse than cash from a usability perspective, but I think they're less crass. You might be unhappy to receive a gift card, but there are many people who would fell warmer and fuzzier receiving a (thoughtfully-selected) gift card, rather than cash.
> And the principle of it is that the cash they could have given you is now earning the retailer interest?
As the article says, vanishingly few retailers make interest or investment returns off gift card money. Nearly all of them consider it working capital and use it to help run their businesses.
Either way, I find this to be a weird objection. A gift is about the giver and the receiver. If a third party makes interest off some unrelated side transaction, it's kinda petty to be worked up about it.