Gift Card Ideas

[Waxman]

My detail shop sells quite a few gift cards around the holidays. I redesigned the cards this year and they look very good.

We participate in 'Midnight Madness', a one-day event in early December with progressive discounts fro 6pm-12pm. This has been well-received by our customers.

Are there any other ideas I should try to boost holiday gift card sales? Anything you have done that works for you?

TIA

 

[bigleo48]

Now that I can accept credit cards with my PC or iphone, I was thinking of renting a spot of a table at the mall and sell them as stocking suffers. But I have yet to do so.

My site is attendant and we have premade cards my attendants sell. I have a sign at the road and at every bay and device.

Big

 

[Waxman]

I made some postcards featuring the car with the bow on it like on my website page here:

http://houseofwax.us/events/

It will go into cars we detail as a promo piece and says how a gift card is like giving a new car.

 

[Washmee]

Now that I can accept credit cards with my PC or iphone, I was thinking of renting a spot of a table at the mall and sell them as stocking suffers. But I have yet to do so.

My site is attendant and we have premade cards my attendants sell. I have a sign at the road and at every bay and device.

Big

I am renting a space at the biggest mall in my county. Belden Village Mall We will be there for the final week before Christmas. Its not going to be cheap, $1500 for a small table directly in the center of the mall. It will cost me another $1000 to staff it for the week. I spent another $500 on signage and supplies. I am using my laptop tethered to a cell phone as a cash register. Then I can log into my server at the car wash and make my transactions that way. Its a pretty big gamble, but if you never try , you'll never succeed in life.

 

[Waxman]

Employees are taking part in a detail shop contest for gift card sales. 1st employee to sell 10 gift cards gets a Longhorn Steakhouse gift card. They are excited to compete (sell).

 

[soapy]

I have got some of the local high schools selling tokens for fund raisers this time of year. Works great for them as people are willing to spend more around christmas. They get a cut of the sales.

 

[Waxman]

Midnight Madness

My region has an annual pre-Christmas sale that many merchants take place in called Midnight Madness. Merchants commit to hours of 6pm-12 midnight for sales and special discounts at their stores. My sale in the detail shop featured shrimp cocktail, fancy cheeses & crackers, asstd. olives and cider and egg nog. We also had a local dance studio come by with about 20 dancers and perform some spirited dances.

My sale was unusually successful this year and I increased my 6-hour gross over 2010 by over 300%!!!

I am sure the weather had alot to do with the turnout, but I can also forsee adding an on-line, website-based sale next year that ties in with the in-store 'Madness' hours.

FWIW, other local merchants in my depressed economic area also reported better than 2010 numbers, one in particular (high-end artisan gallery store) was almost 400% up over last year!

 

[dewey9876]

This is our 2nd year selling gift cards, prepaid cards and passes at out local mall. Washme I am interested in hearing how you made out. It is a gamble but you gotta try new things.

 

[Washmee]

This is our 2nd year selling gift cards, prepaid cards and passes at out local mall. Washme I am interested in hearing how you made out. It is a gamble but you gotta try new things.

Not good so far. The traffic at the malls in our area is definately down this year. I'll post an update next week.

 

[Waxman]

Mall traffic is brisk in my area; went yesterday and the place (Westfarms mall in CT) was mobbed.

My gift card sales are chugging along (mainly for detailing) and my feeling is I am up over 2010. However, the last few days get crazy so can make or break as far as total sales and up/down from previous year.

 

[Washmee]

My card sales at the wash are doing just fine, even with the rainy weather. I will be interested to see what kind of sales Amazon did this Christmas. Everyone I know bought at least a few items from them.

 

[Waxman]

2012 was a record-breaking year for me for gift card sales. I also spent the most in advertising and marketing my pre-paid gift cards, so it's nice that these efforts paid off.

 

[MEP001]

2012 was a record-breaking year for me for gift card sales.

How'd you manage that?

 

[Waxman]

It seemed to be a combination of things: weather was good, Xmas on Sunday, lots of radio ads, print ads and flyers in detail customer cars, social media.

Also, even though I have been here since 1996, some people still come and say:'wow. I never knew there was a place like this in town'.

 

[MEP001]

I guess you missed that you said "2012" which is still six days away.

 

[Waxman]

I guess you missed that you said "2012" which is still six days away.

So that was sarcasm and here I was thinking that you really cared.


Booo hooo.

 

[MEP001]

I do actually, and in fact I have a thought that may or may not work for you. I want to offer current customers a way to earn free washes by getting new people in. We're self-serve only, and my thought was to have a card for people to take home and fill out one side with their name and address and give it to someone else to fill out the other side and mail to me. The original customer and potential new one would each get some tokens mailed to them.