Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to make a plan for using those gift
Speaker 1: cards that you and family members may have received over
Speaker 1: the holidays. I'm writing this tip as much for me
Speaker 1: as anyone else. Each year, my older kids in particular,
Speaker 1: wind up receiving gift cards from far flung friends and
Speaker 1: family members. We note who has received what so we
Speaker 1: can send thank you notes, but that thank you writing
Speaker 1: process tends to happen prior to the gift cards being used.
Speaker 1: Over the next week or so after Christmas, the piles
Speaker 1: of presents get moved up to people's bedrooms, my kids
Speaker 1: get absorbed in other things like traveling to see relatives
Speaker 1: and then starting up school again. In the course of this,
Speaker 1: gift cards can wind up lost or forgotten, and this
Speaker 1: seems like a waste. I mean, I love Amazon, Target,
Speaker 1: Dick's Sporting Goods, and other retailers as much as anyone,
Speaker 1: but I don't really think they need the free money.
Speaker 1: So this year, I'm resolving that all gift cards are
Speaker 1: going to go in an envelope with the recipient's name
Speaker 1: on it. As soon as we've made a note for
Speaker 1: thanking purposes. And then each person who has a gift
Speaker 1: card envelope is going to get a designated day for
Speaker 1: using them. I plan my weeks on Friday afternoons and
Speaker 1: so on. A handful of Fridays in January and February,
Speaker 1: I will set a day in the upcoming week to
Speaker 1: feature one envelope. I might decide that my twelve year
Speaker 1: old will get the following Sunday. I'll tell him a
Speaker 1: few days ahead of time that this is his official
Speaker 1: gift card day. We'll discuss what he might want, and
Speaker 1: he can do some research and think about it. Then
Speaker 1: on the official gift card day, we'll make our online
Speaker 1: purchases and visit any retailers that we'd prefer to visit
Speaker 1: in person. By making this an official priority for the
Speaker 1: week I think it's far more likely to happen now.
Speaker 1: Of course, there are other ways to make sure gift
Speaker 1: cards get used too. For instance, they are very easy
Speaker 1: to regift. If you receive more than you know what
Speaker 1: to do with, you could hang on to a feud
Speaker 1: to give to other people for birthdays or bar mitzvahs
Speaker 1: or the like. And if you get a card to
Speaker 1: a retailer that you're pretty sure you won't use. There
Speaker 1: are sites such as card pool or card cash that
Speaker 1: will take your gift card for somewhere between seventy to
Speaker 1: eighty cents on the dollar usually, and you could sell
Speaker 1: them off at rays and also buy discounted cards for
Speaker 1: somewhere that you would like to use. But for most
Speaker 1: of us, I think it's as much about making the
Speaker 1: time as finding something that we'd want. By designating official
Speaker 1: gift card using days in January and February, we can
Speaker 1: make sure that we don't leave money on the table.
Speaker 1: If you have a good system for making sure you
Speaker 1: and your family use your gift cards, please let me
Speaker 1: know about it. You can email me at Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: Podcast at iHeartMedia dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 1: You can send me your tips, your questions, or anything else.
Speaker 1: Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast Pod that's b E the number four then
Speaker 1: Breakfast Pod. You can also shoot me an email at
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast Podcast at iHeartMedia dot com that before Breakfast
Speaker 1: is spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much,
Speaker 1: should I look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,
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