This year I got some beautiful stuff for Christmas, like floral bouquets,
a wedding announcement from my dear cousin and his longtime girlfriend that's lovingly designed to be a two-sided keepsake ornament shaped as a pretty snowflake, and some cold hard cash (what any young publisher really needs), along with the usual tepid crap, like plastic cards.
What disturbs me most about it are the gaping vulnerabilities savvy companies use to exploit the mass consumer, and they do so with impunity. Here's a great example: on a recent shopping trip, I thought I expertly calculated my gift card usage down to cents, and I was right. In exchange for my shopping prowess, here's what I got back from my friendly neighborhood (and totally red-faced, embarrassed) cashier:
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| Wow....the a**hole is strong on this card! |
That's right, the cheapskate asshole who designed this program for a local supermarket chain will not allow cashiers give back a mere .$36 in coinage to the consumer, you know, in case I went power drunk with my excess riches. Uh, thanks. And so, the average consumer gets tricked into giving cold hard cash to a faceless conglomerate instead putting it where it belongs: in the gift recipients' pocket. Not convinced by mere words? OK, let's do the math together.
For example: one very busy, successful store in my town (I actually LOVE it) sells about 1,000 of these cards in racks by each check out line, and after they're used, they each have a remaining $.36 on them. That's $360.00 profit for them, barring manufacturing costs for printing the card, and distribution to stores. Next up, 10,000 cards in my home county are sold throughout the holiday season. That's $3,600.00 for the company, and not you, the consumer, or your "loved one", and I am being generous with the amounts. Most folks leave a lot more on these types of cards, because it's too much of a pain in the ass to use up the $1 to $2 that's left on them.
Feel me on this one? Good. I'm trusting that you understand the dynamic here, right? Great! Don't do it again. Bad shopper! You're actually feeding an industry of crooks. Live and learn, folks, and then let's move forward together, conceptually-speaking. That's all is is.
Thank you.
Here's your homework: http://www.dailyfinance.com/2012/04/20/new-laws-mean-unused-gift-card-money-wont-be-a-gift-to-stores/
