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October 12, 2008, 08:35 PM ET
Gift Cards: "New Currency" for Charities
This holiday season, millions of Americans will contemplate what present to purchase for a relative or friend and then, out of ideas, they will buy a gift card. And each year, millions of people will forget to redeem them or spend only a fraction of their gift card’s value.
The amount of money that goes unspent each year from unused gift cards is staggering: $10-billion of the $100-billion spent on cards annually, according to some estimates. Now Plastic Jungle, a Web site that helps people sell or trade in gift cards, is hoping to channel some of that money to charities.
The company has started a fund-raising program that allows nonprofit groups to collect unused gift cards from any company, as long as each card is worth $10 or more, and convert them into cash.
The charities turn the cards over to Plastic Jungle, which gives the charities 70 percent of the total gift-card value.
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