Modern Manners: Gift Card Etiquette

Illustrated by Pierre Roy, Vogue, December 1937
Illustrated by Pierre Roy, Vogue, December 1937

William Norwich, Vogue

One of myTwitter followers recently asked me for a ruling on the etiquette of gift cards. In the final countdown to Christmas with her shopping list still incomplete, she is swaying toward giving her first gift card, but she wonders-are they lazy presents?

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In theory, a gift card is just as acceptable as something wrapped under the tree as long as it conveys genuine thoughtfulness. If you know a person is sweet on a particular store, a gift certificate there is great. Or if you know they are dying to experience a certain restaurant, by all means, get them a gift card to that restaurant, emphasis on that restaurant, not one you think they absolutely must try. Whether it is a restaurant, a shop, a Broadway show, a Caribbean island, you think you're giving them a gift but not really. Actually what you're doing is taking someone hostage, exerting your tastes over theirs, by giving them a gift card they can use only at the establishment of your choice. Now that's rude.

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Being thoughtful in your selection yields a very much holiday-wonderful result. Exhibit A: Friends chip in and buy a young artist a gift card for Utrecht, a chain of art supply stores in New York City and convey their heartfelt support of his work. The gift card is tucked into a copy of the new biography of Rex Whistler, titled In Search of Rex Whistler, one of his favorite artists. Or Exhibit B: A recently divorced friend had to move houses and took a selection of family photographs to a framer's so she would have something to hang on her walls on her first night in the new place. When the work was ready to be picked up, she arrived at the framer's shop and was told a friend had come by days earlier and paid for everything.

The secret of giving chicly is to focus not only on the thoughtfulness of the gift but also the style with which it is presented. "My only must is that the gift card-or any gift, really-has to come with a handwritten note," says Moda Operandi's editorial and social media director Hayley Bloomingdale. So if you'd like to give your sister a gift certificate to Neiman Marcus, include a note attached to a bunch of her favorite roses delivered to her home, Secret Santa-style.

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I personally don't give gift cards. I prefer to find odd things, small and easy to wrap, usually books or films I think are amusing that the people on my list might not have noticed in the normal course of their iPad-hopping this year. The cost of these books or films is generally so obvious that people don't focus on it but rather on the message of the gift instead. (I hope.) With gift cards I'm sure I'd go over budget because dollar figures can look embarrassingly low, especially when you are trying to scale the heights of chic gift-giving, especially these days.

In all of these conversations about giving, what really is bad manners is anyone who would complain about any present they receive. We'd love to find a little blue box at the toe of our stockings, but thank you very much for the gift card. Thank you for thinking of me. Isn't this what recent current events reminds us? To be grateful for what we have?

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