Facebook has announced that it has launched a reloadable prepaid card that can be used at Jamba Juice, Olive Garden, Sephora, and Target. The card runs on the Discover Network but is locked down to the specified retailers.
Facebook members can purchase and send the multi-tasking gift card, accessible from the “Gift Cards and Digital” category within Facebook Gifts, to their social network friends.
From a CNET article:
“We’re starting this early rollout as another way for people to instantly send their friends gifts through Facebook,” a company spokesperson told CNET. “Each gift is a set value at a particular retailer, chosen by the sender.”
Recipients can keep the card and future gifts from friends and future loads can go onto the same card, according to the Facebook Web site:
Facebook Cards are reusable. After you’ve received a card, the next time you get a Facebook Card gift, it will instantly be added to your existing card. Your card can hold multiple gift balances, and each balance is dedicated to the retailer associated with the gift. For example, you might have gift balances of $100 at Sephora, $75 at Target, $50 at Olive Garden, and $8.25 at Jamba Juice.
You can find the Facebook page describing the card here.
Still, the card only scratches the surface of what is possible for both Facebook and retailers. Rather than being what is seemingly a random list of retailers, the cards should be organized around interests and include retailers that match the interests of those in a particular group. For example, there are a number of sports-related interest groups and pages on Facebook. Creating a gift card that is accepted at places like GNC, Sports Authority, and the Nike Store might be even more intuitive than one that applies to a wider variety of stores.