Back in November, the second-hand gift card exchange Raise.com added an additional option, called Raise Pay, to buy first-hand cards and earn ‘Raise Cash’ which can be used against future purchases. It’s similar to MPX and some other reward programs which sell you a gift card to the retailers your shopping at, often in exact denominations you desire, and offers rewards on the purchase.
Today, Raise updated their website to integrate the Raise Cash offering within the discounted gift card exchange as opposed to leaving it on separate tab. So for example, when you navigate to buy a Home Depot gift card, it’ll give you the option at the top of the page to buy a first-hand card in whichever denomination you choose and earn 1.50% Raise Cash, or you can scroll down and see all the discounted gift cards available. (image below)
Raise sent out an email to their sellers about the change with a positive spin, that the ‘changes will generate more interest in our marketplace and generate more sales’. Indeed, from a Raise buyer’s perspective it’s very helpful the way they have it now since it creates a more steady marketplace where cards are always available at a discount. It makes a lot of sense that Raise created this integration of discounted gift cards and Raise Cash.
As a Raise seller, I have mixed feelings. I do think this will enhance the overall Raise experience and lead to more customers which is good ultimately good for sellers. But I also think it creates more in-your-face competition to the sellers which will result in less discounted gift card sales and more Raise Cash sales.
The biggest loss is for brands which historically sold at or near full face value. For example, Best Buy, Walmart, and Home Depot have always sold at near full value, and going forward that won’t fly (unless you have a specific desired denomination which Raise Cash doesn’t have) since people will just choose Raise Cash which is found at the top of the page and more secure.
Overall, it’s a win for the buyer and a mixed bag for sellers, probably more negative than positive.
Two other new features were added in the Raise system update:
- You can now filter by denomination to find card in the amounts for you. They’ll had this on the app for a while, and now added to the website. Major improvement, in my opinion.
- Another interesting feature they’ve added is the ability to see how many gift cards were sold from a particular brand in the past day. That might be somewhat useful for sellers. You can find similar aggregative data on Giftcardwiki.com.
