There is no question that gift cards have been hugely successful, at least if you measure how big of a market they’ve become. But in my opinion, the success that has been lavished on gift cards has mostly been undeserved. By just about all measures, they are a terrible product; as gifts they are usually impersonal and thoughtless, often come with ridiculously high fees and short expiration dates, are easy to lose, and generally hard to get all of your value from. I suspect they have been a success because, well, most gift card issuers have been successful and tricking consumers into buying them by hiding the fees and, let’s face it, most occasions that would warrant a gift card in our culture have become fairly shallow events.

That being my personal view of gift cards, it is hard for me to comment positively about a website (www.giftcardgirlfriend.com) with the purpose of finding occasions for you to give the right kind of gift card, and helps you solve problems like not wanting the recipient know how much you spent on a gift card.

In fact, the very existence of a site like this somewhat validates my overall view of gift cards, doesn’t it?