Quick, would you pay an extra $50 for this card?
December 5, 2012
According to USA Today, the new Starbucks gift card that costs $450 but only comes with $400 spending value on it will be available on Gilt.com and the quoted cultural anthropologist says, “Not everyone is impressed” by the appeal to snobbery and exclusivity that this card represents.
No kidding?
Is anyone?
Supposedly it comes with free perks but none are touted in the report which is all about the potential “collector value” of the thing. I wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t come with very much more than the standard Starbucks program attached to all gift cards.Ā And of course the VP of card and payments suggests he’d buy one for his Mom – it’d be more than his job’s worth not to tell a journalist anything different.
But I’ll point out the key thing that makes this thing no more worth the steel it’s carved out of and that’s the quote from Starbucks’s selling partner, Gilt’s executive VP: “When you’re waiting in line at Starbucks, the next person in line won’t have it.”
So, this super exclusive, limited run, card doesn’t get you out of waiting in line? Then believe me when I say, no one in line cares what card you pull out of your wallet.
All I can say is ” what?!” what is the point o this card and why pay $50 to have it. Plus with all the mobile checkout options available (which Starbucks has the option of) who will really see the card? Silly.
Exactly!
Quick response: NO.
I did a little more digging because I thought SOMETHING must make this card special enough that a person would pay $50 over its value for it. Apparently, you get the same benefits afforded to Starbucks gold members, which as far as I can tell is one free drink or food item after every 12 purchases. Uh…
People will buy it because there are only going to be 5,000 up for grabs, and oh, look how special I am to have this metal card that cost $50 to make! Stories like this just make me grumble about how far removed some of us are from reality. Why is this something anyone would care about? (Disclaimer: I do not drink coffee, and the only time I’ve ever gone to Starbucks was for a hot chocolate on a cold morning in NYC and a brownie in the hospital after my angiogram.)
Guess: validated!!
I was thinking maybe Starbucks didn’t think folks would notice? They couldn’t do the math? The big kerfuffle over here right now is how Amazon and Starbucks don’t pay much corporate tax to the UK government in spite of all the money they rake in from here. They have tax-efficient arrangements with other countries in the EU and some of the Members of Parliament are up in arms about it. Like they don’t do things as tax efficiently as they can…
Or they think people will just go ahead and toss that money their way, regardless.
I had read up on that issue with the taxes etc. in the UK! I was wondering what became of it.
What a load of horse shit.
I KNOW!
What a load of crap. Maybe if it was $200 for a $400 value, but to pay MORE than it will be worth? That’s bananas. What kind of market testing went into that?
That’s a good question. “What would possess you to pay more for no extra value but a shiny thingie?”
Absolutely not, wtf is this?! $50 for an exclusive card? Hahaha
Nutty.
OK, this is dumb! What’s the point of the card again? To say you have one? And then what? LOL…this is really the silliest thing I’ve seen in a while.
Right – to say it to … whom? Who cares?
The simple answer: No.
The longer answer: HELLS NO!
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what? i’m reading this wrong, yes? FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY BUCKS on freaking Starbucks????
Well, no. I wouldn’t spend $4.50 on Starbucks’s coffee. It’s awful. And you couldn’t pay me to pay any vendor extra dollars for the privilege of carrying their plastic around.
You could buy a mighty fine coffeemaker for $450…
That’s what I thought too!
The secret for us is buying their beans on sale or whatever and just use the coffeemaker at home. Because the beans themselves were roasted fine, they just brew terribly.
My BF (who loves Starbucks) found your observation about waiting line hilarious. He jokingly said that he’d only find the card useful if it allowed him to kick people out of the comfy chairs. š
There you go! That’s value add. haha.