Some shoppers have felt the need to stealthily scan items in stores with their smartphones. They'd rather not be accused of "showrooming," the practice in which one scopes out merchandise in a brick-and-mortar store, only to purchase it online—at Amazon, likely—for less money. This week, though, Target began actively encouraging mobile phone scans nationwide.
Spring is now a hot season for gift cards. Why? It’s when consumers are compelled to buy gifts for Mother’s Day, as well as graduations, weddings, First Communions, Father’s Day, and more. That’s a lot of gifts to buy, and chances are you won’t know exactly what each recipient really wants.
On Tuesday, March 20, the daily deal space will be buzzing with a special offer from Amazon’s surging flash sale site, AmazonLocal. A $10 Amazon gift card can be yours for the sum of just $5.
If you’re one those people who thinks kids today have it easy — maybe you had to walk uphill to school, both ways, in the snow — well, this is going to sound like another step towards societal decay: Students at one high school in Ohio are rewarded with Visa gift cards just for showing [...]
Still don’t know what to do with all those gift cards you got for the holidays? United Airlines will now take them off your hands in exchange for frequent flyer miles.
Retailers and restaurants love gift cards—so much so that they load them with bonus cash in order to sell more cards. This makes total sense once you realize how often gift cards aren’t used at all, and how all those cards add up to billions of dollars in profits.
In a survey conducted this past weekend, 25% of consumers said they hadn’t yet bought a single present for the holidays. But they can’t blame retailers — many of which launched Christmas sales starting in September.
Apparently, the regular old bustling holiday shopping season isn’t enough for retailers constantly looking for new ways to stir up business and increase sales numbers. Nowadays, to rouse consumers into ceaseless shopping sprees, it seems like every other day from the end of November through December is branded as a sales “event” of one kind [...]
Gift givers assume that recipients are equally appreciative of presents that are “both solicited and unsolicited.” Unfortunately, the givers are wrong. In five different studies, giftees were consistently more appreciative when receiving something they’d asked for.
Tapping into the bargain-hunting mentality that resulted in an epic spending frenzy over the holiday weekend, fast food outlets are hoping that consumers have built up an appetite—for their food, of course, as well as more enticing deals. Ultra-cheap offers from the likes of McDonald’s and Subway form the basis of the recipe restaurants are [...]
It’s that time of year again. To drum up holiday sales, retailers are once again taking creative license with the term “Black Friday”, and national chains are dishing out bonuses to fuel gift card purchases (think $5 bonus card when you buy a $25 card) that’ll wind up in stockings and awkward Secret Santa office [...]
