How to Get a Gift Card Program Ready for Holiday Season 2015

Summer is just coming to an end and the holiday season will soon be upon us.

Whether you’re a small, medium or large business now is the time to start thinking about your 2015 holiday season gift card program – both plastic and e-gift card.Isn’t It Too Early?

It is definitely not too early to start thinking about starting a gift card program for your brand because you will have to decide the design of your gift cards, finalize the card quantity you want etc and the card production timelines alone can be 6 to 8 weeks.

Beyond this you will want to get your gift card program strategy decided before you order. A gift card program strategy can include deciding whether you want to use third party gift card malls to distribute your gift cards or just use displays in your stores. It also includes whether you want to just use plastic gift cards, e-gift cards or a mix of both.

Why Gift Cards Matter During the Holiday Shopping Season

It’s particularly important to have a gift card program during the holiday season. This is because time-short and stressed holiday shoppers find gift cards to be an easy and convenient gift giving option, with 8 in 10 of consumers looking for a gift card option. Not having a gift card program will force consumers who want to give a gift card to choose another brand, resulting in a loss of sales. Holiday gift card sales are expected to reach $29.8 billion , highlighting how in-demand gift cards are during this time period.

Another benefit of selling gift cards is that this drives visits to your brick-and-mortar locations in January and February from the gift card recipients during a time when sales may not be as strong and it may be more difficult to get shoppers in to your locations.

The time-saving and convenient nature of e-gift cards make them extremely popular among gift givers as well. It’s incredibly easy and fast to set up an e-gift program with Givex. We create a custom-skinned website that matches your branding and you can sell e-gift cards as soon as that is up!

In December 2014 67% of total gift card sales were from e-gift cards. Rising in popularity among all age demographics e-gift cards allow gift-givers to instantly send a gift to the recipients inbox when they do not have time to grab a plastic gift card. In-fact December 24 was the highest day for e-gift card sales in 2014.

Having plastic gift cards is still important however as 77% of consumers state they want a choice between plastic and e-gift cards to be available to them as some recipients prefer plastic while others prefer e-gift.

How Does Starting a Gift Card Program Work?

With Givex’s over 15 years of experience setting up an effective gift card program is smooth, simple and easy.

Simply contact a Givex account manager and decide if you want re-loadable cards or not. Have your card art work ready and finalized. The account manager will work with you to figure out what kind of program is best for your business’s needs and give you the timelines.

We do gift card programs for big brands such as Wendy’s and Fairmont Hotels and Resorts to name a few.

But we haven’t forgotten the small business owner either. We have a GiveXpress program that provides an affordable, quick-start and turnkey gift card program package to small businesses.

Consider Givex to be your reputable and reliable gift card program provider! Contact us today for holiday season 2015!

If you want to know more about the difference about plastic and e-gift card programs read this blog post here.