<p>I started a thread complaining about fees on gift card purchases, but thought I should start one on gift cards that are GOOD DEALS for all of us last-minute shoppers. </p>
<p>Panera Bread is offering a $10 e-gift certificate with the purchase of $100. They have a charge for the regular gift cards, but were willing to re-load a card I had with no extra fee. There is no charge for an e-gift certificate.</p>
<p>If you have a registered Starbucks card, now through Dec 31 spend a total of $50+ and receive a $10 e-card. I don’t know if this deal is open to all registered Starbucks card holders (as it reads) or if it was sent to specific members (gold card, not a unique status).</p>
<p>Outback, $20 bonus card for $100 gift card purchase, Chili’s $10 bonus card for $50 gift card purchase.</p>
<p>At Costco, Sam’s and many others, the cost of the GCards are generally about $79.99 plus tax and have $100 face value. Depending on your state taxes, that’s a nearly 15-20% discount.</p>
<p>A good deal posted by jonri on another thread:</p>
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<p>Lots of smaller places also offer a 10-20% discount on gift card or gift certificate purchases, sometimes you just have to ask. Earlier B&N was giving a $10 GCard for every $75 card you purchased. At one point they offered $20 for every $80 you purchased. Haven’t kept up to see current offerings. S and I bought quite a few cards when they were $75/10.</p>
<p>The B&N store near our house is closing and marked items are $40% off, plus member’s 10% discount and any other discounts you find and bring in (they had a $10 off $25 toy purchase) that you could use GCs with. They also had Black Friday 39% off an hone item, which included some of the 40% off items. Shopped more there than I had for many years.</p>
<p>Panera has a charge for gift cards? First I’ve heard of that. I usually buy Panera GC at my Giant Eagle, which gives 10¢ off gas at their stations (up to 30 gallons) for every $50 GC purchased. Several times a year they double that, which is a 12% return. I buy a ton of Amazon GC there when they do the special.</p>
<p>Max and Erma’s restaurants give a $5 reward card for every $25 GC purchased around the holidays. The reward card must be used between Jan 1 and March 31. Thanksgiving weekend they gave $10 reward cards.</p>
<p>Cheesecake Factory gives you a slice of cake card for every $50 gift card - on Cyber monday I got 2 slice of cake cards for my $50 gift card!</p>