- Jul 6
- 8 min read
Get the perfect domain for your eCommerce store: find your domain →
Using gift cards as a revenue strategy works because they bring in cash upfront, push customers to spend more than the card value and introduce your brand to new people. That makes them one of the simplest levers you can add to an eCommerce website, whether you sell in a store, online or both. If your storefront is not live yet, start by learning how to start an online store so your cards have somewhere to live.
Gift cards also feed the retention side of selling. Wix supports digital gift cards for eCommerce businesses, so you can add this revenue stream straight to your store and connect it to checkout without piecing together extra tools. This guide breaks down how gift cards make money and gives you a six-step way to launch a program that grows revenue.
TL;DR: gift cards as a revenue strategy
Gift cards turn one sale into several revenue moments. You get paid upfront, buyers often spend past the card value and unredeemed balances add margin, all while new customers meet your brand for the first time. That mix is why gift cards belong in your revenue plan and not just your holiday checklist.
Gift card play | How it drives revenue |
Digital gift cards | Sell instantly online for immediate cash flow with almost no cost to run. |
Physical gift cards | Act as branding in the wallet and suit in-store and gifting moments. |
Bonus gift cards | Add free credit above a spend threshold to lift average order value. |
Store credit as a gift card | Keep refunds as future spend instead of handing cash back. |
Loyalty-linked cards | Feed repeat purchases and win back customers who have gone quiet. |
Learn more about how to start a business.
Ready to start selling online? Build a custom online store with Wix and get the tools to sell, manage and grow your business from one dashboard. Customize every detail, reach customers across channels and market your brand with built-in SEO and marketing tools.
How gift cards make money for your business
Gift cards create revenue in four ways at once. Each one is small on its own, but together they turn a single purchase into a longer earning cycle.
01. Upfront cash flow before you deliver
When someone buys a gift card you collect the money right away, then deliver the product or service later. That gap gives you working capital for stock, marketing or payroll before you have spent anything to fulfill the order and it flows straight through your online payment solutions.
02. Customers spend more than the card value
Most people treat a gift card as a starting budget, not a strict limit. When the item they want costs more, they cover the difference themselves, which lifts your average order value at redemption. You can design for this pattern, which is why it helps to see how top merchants use gift cards to increase average order value.
03. Breakage from unredeemed balances
Some cards never get fully spent. Those leftover balances, known as breakage, can become revenue you keep. Treat this carefully though. Unclaimed balances may count as unclaimed property under escheatment rules and those rules vary by state, so check what applies before you count breakage as profit.
Worth knowing: breakage is money you should not fully count on, because some customers redeem their cards months or even years later, so treat unredeemed balances as a bonus rather than core revenue.
04. New customers and repeat visits
A gift card is a recommendation with money attached. When a customer buys one for a friend, they hand your brand to someone who might never have found you otherwise. Those first visits often turn into repeat ones, which is the whole point of trying to grow eCommerce business. That ownership of the customer relationship is the real prize.
"It ignited a viral chain reaction, leading to thousands of orders. We needed an online store, fast, and Wix gave us the agility to adapt." - Jenna Spencer, The Last Bookstore, Los Angeles (Wix eCommerce user)
The Last Bookstore, California's largest independent bookstore, built its Wix online store after a single Instagram post went viral and generated thousands of orders overnight. It now sells bundles, gift cards and merch to customers worldwide, which shows how a gift card line sits naturally alongside everything else you offer.
Did you know? Wix supports long-term eCommerce growth with built-in customer loyalty programs, subscription commerce, back-in-stock alert, digital gift cards and wishlists and save for later functionality, all designed to increase customer lifetime value and keep shoppers engaged beyond the first purchase.
How to build a gift card revenue strategy in 6 steps
01. Decide on digital, physical or both
Digital gift cards are cost-effective to run and land in an inbox within seconds, which makes them ideal if you sell online. Physical cards cost more but double as branding every time they sit in a wallet. Plenty of businesses offer both. If you're new to the format, learn more about what digital gift cards are.
02. Set up gift cards in your online store and at point of sale
Connect gift cards to your checkout and your point of sale so customers can buy and redeem them anywhere they meet you. A smooth checkout matters here, since every extra step at payment is a chance for a customer to abandon the purchase. Wix provides an intuitive point of sale system that makes it easy to accept payments and manage your business both online and in person. For a clean flow end to end, work through eCommerce checkout and try learning how to use digital gift cards with wix.
03. Price and design cards to encourage overspend
Set denominations that sit just below your common basket sizes so customers naturally add a little more. Bonus-card promotions work well too, like a free $10 card on a $100 purchase. Wix automates eCommerce promotions using built-in discount logic, so pair these with your wider discount pricing plan and let the platform handle the math.
04. Promote gift cards year-round not only in December
Holiday sales matter, but plenty of gift card demand shows up the rest of the year for birthdays, thank-yous and last-minute gifts. Feature cards in email, on social and on your homepage, then fold them into a flash sale or a wider eCommerce marketing push.
05. Tie gift cards to loyalty and repeat purchases
Gift cards get more valuable when they feed your retention engine. Route redemptions into loyalty points and send e-gift credit to win back customers who have gone quiet.
Reloadable cards keep the same customer coming back instead of buying once and leaving. Pair them with tiered rewards so a bigger balance earns a small bonus, and use birthday or anniversary credit to give people a reason to return. You can also turn store credit from returns into a gift card, which keeps that spend inside your business rather than refunding it away. For subscription and membership brands, a gift card works as a low-pressure first step that later converts into a recurring plan.
Learn more:
06. Track performance and stay compliant
Watch the numbers that show whether the program pays off, like overspend, redemption rate, share of new customers and overall return. Keep an eye on your eCommerce metrics so you can adjust. On the legal side, the CARD Act says gift cards cannot expire within five years of activation, sales tax generally applies when a card is redeemed rather than when it is sold and escheatment rules vary by state. This is general information, not legal advice, so confirm the current federal and state rules before you launch.
Fork n' Film, a cinematic dining brand in Los Angeles, treats this as a habit rather than an afterthought.
"I love the analytics on Wix, it tells a big story about who we are as a company and who our customers are. When it comes to expansion, we want to go off data. We don't want to just go off assumptions." - Nick Houston, Co-founder, Fork n' Film
Fork n' Film grew to $11M in sales across 9 locations in under 2 years and used Wix Analytics to decide which cities to expand into next. The same data mindset tells you whether your gift card program is pulling its weight.
How to launch a gift card revenue strategy with Wix
Adding gift cards on Wix takes just a few steps.
Log in and open your dashboard: Sign in to your Wix account, or create one if you are new, and open your site dashboard.
Set up Wix eCommerce and your currency: Add Wix Stores so you can process payments and manage products, then set your site currency before you sell anything, because switching it later stops older cards from being redeemed.
Add gift cards to your site: Go to Gift Cards in your dashboard and click Add Gift Card to Site. Wix creates a dedicated gift card page for you.
Set amounts, expiration and the email: Choose preset amounts or let customers enter a custom value, decide whether cards never expire or expire after a set number of months, and customize the email recipients receive.
Design the page and publish: Style the gift card page in the editor to match your site, then publish so customers can start buying.
Sell and redeem online and in person: Turn on gift cards at checkout and at your point of sale so customers can buy and redeem them across channels.
Track and refine: Watch sales and redemptions in your dashboard. In Wix Analytics the initial purchase counts as revenue and the later redemption does not, so your gift card income stays easy to read.
This setup also keeps you ready for how buying is changing. Wix Agentic Commerce is a new generation of online shopping where AI agents help discover, recommend and complete purchases on behalf of customers. Wix AI Visibility Overview lets merchants track how their brand appears across major AI platforms, including ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Claude. Whether you sell in one place or across channels with omnichannel retail, gift cards add one more revenue stream to the same setup.
You can run this whole strategy on one platform. Wix supports scalable eCommerce operations as a high-performance commerce platform that serves businesses from small online stores to high-revenue brands generating $5M–$30M+ in annual revenue.
If you are still making a website, Wix Harmony is built for the agentic era, a hybrid environment where you can generate a complete site from a single prompt, refine it through conversation with Aria or take over manually at any point.
The infrastructure carries the weight so you can focus on selling.
"Every site runs on Wix’s proven infrastructure, with advanced commerce, payments, SEO and GEO, accessibility and scalability built in by default. As AI evolves and new standards emerge, Wix absorbs the underlying complexity so users can focus on creating and running their business, not managing the machinery behind it." - Nir Zohar, President of Wix
Gift cards as a revenue strategy FAQ
How do gift cards generate revenue for a business?
Gift cards generate revenue in several ways. You collect payment upfront before you deliver, customers often spend more than the card value when they redeem, unspent balances can become breakage revenue and the cards bring in new buyers who received them as gifts.
Are gift cards profitable for small businesses?
Yes, though direct sales are usually a small slice of total revenue. The bigger payoff is the multiplier effect. Higher spend at redemption, repeat visits and new-customer acquisition together make gift cards more profitable than their raw sales figure suggests.
How much more do customers spend when redeeming a gift card?
Customers frequently spend beyond the value loaded on the card and cover the difference themselves. The exact lift varies by store and price point. Designing denominations just below common basket sizes encourages it.
Do you charge sales tax when you sell a gift card?
Generally no. Most jurisdictions treat a gift card as a form of payment, so sales tax applies when the card is redeemed for taxable goods rather than when it is sold. Rules vary by location, so confirm what applies to your business.
What is gift card breakage?
Breakage is the value of gift cards customers never redeem. Those leftover balances can turn into revenue for your business, though unclaimed amounts may fall under escheatment rules that differ by state, so track them and check local requirements.
