To send a gift card online, buy an e-gift card on the shop’s website and the shop will email the code, to them or to you. To make it land as a present rather than a receipt, have it sent to your own email, then pass it on inside something with your words around it: a letter saying why you chose that shop, a photo or two, and the code last, so they read you before they read the number. Here’s how to do that step by step, what to write with it, and how to make it open on the day.
Why a forwarded voucher email falls flat
Most shops will email a gift card straight to the person, with a small box for your message. The box takes a sentence, the email looks like every other receipt, and it lands whenever the shop’s system gets round to it, occasionally in spam. Forward it yourself and it’s worse: your note sits on top of an order number and a thank you for shopping with them.
None of that is the gift’s fault. A voucher is a good present. It says you know what they like, and you trust them to choose. It just needs the part a card in the post used to carry: the bit where you say so.
Step by step: buy it, write the letter, wrap it, send the link
- Buy it to yourself. From any shop that sells e-gift cards or e-vouchers: a bookshop, a garden centre, a restaurant, the cinema. When it asks where to send it, give your own email. Check whether it works online, in store or both, and note the use-by date.
- Write the letter. Before you touch the code. Why this shop, what you picture them buying, and one line about them. A few short paragraphs is plenty.
- Wrap it. Paste the code, the PIN or the link into the gift in a digital envelope, or add the voucher as a picture or a PDF. Name the shop and the use-by date, so nobody has to dig for them next spring.
- Add the extras. A photo of the two of you, a short video, in whatever order you like. Put the gift last, so the letter does its job first.
- Send the link. By text, WhatsApp or email. They open the envelope, read what you wrote, then pull a ribbon and the code appears.
The digital gift page shows the wrapping, and what they see when the ribbon comes off.
Sending it by text, WhatsApp or email
The envelope travels as a single link, so it goes wherever you’d paste one: a text, a WhatsApp chat, an email, the family group. Stampgoose can also email it to them for you. The preview that unfurls under the link shows who it’s from and a picture of an envelope in the design you chose, never the code. When they tap it, it opens in the browser they already have, and the code only appears once they’ve answered your passphrase and pulled the ribbon. If it would go to a busy family chat, send it to them directly instead, so it doesn’t scroll past before they see it.
What to write with a gift card
Three things work: why that shop, what you imagine them doing with it, and permission to spend it on themselves. The amount never needs a mention.
Birthday
For more birthday lines to start from, the birthday card guide has them by person. With a voucher, point at the thing it’s for.
Happy birthday, Ollie. This is for the climbing wall, because you keep saying you’ll go back and then don’t. Book a session and send me a photo from halfway up.
Happy birthday, Nadia. I know you’ll try to spend this on the kids. Don’t. It’s for the boots you keep showing me on your phone.
Christmas
Happy Christmas, Dad. It’s for the garden centre, so you can buy the next thing the slugs will eat. Choose something with a long Latin name.
Merry Christmas, you two. Dinner’s on us this year, at the Italian place you won’t stop talking about. Order the pudding, and the other pudding.
Thank you
Thank you for feeding the cats for a fortnight. This is for the café on your corner, to make up for all the coffees you missed while you were at ours twice a day.
New job or leaving
Good luck in the new job, Tamsin. Here’s lunch on me for your first Friday, once you’ve worked out where the good sandwiches are.
Timing it
A forwarded email arrives when you remember to forward it. An envelope can go early and stay sealed until the date and time you pick: seven o’clock on the birthday morning, or Christmas Day after the stockings. Until then they see the sealed envelope with their name on it and a countdown, and the gift stays wrapped inside.
That suits anyone you won’t see on the day. Send it in November, when you think of it, and let it wait. If they live abroad, the opening time is set in yours, so work out when their breakfast is on your clock.
Group gifts and money
When several of you have chipped in for one gift card, one person buys it and makes the envelope. Collect everyone’s lines into the letter, add their photos as postcards and a short video clip from each if you like, up to ten pieces in all. The letter can say who it’s from; the gift goes in once.
It doesn’t carry money. If you’re giving cash, transfer it the usual way and let the letter say what it’s for. There’s more on that in how to send money as a gift.
A Stampgoose envelope holds the letter, the photos, a video and the wrapped gift, paid for once. It opens in the browser on any phone or computer, with no app and no account, and a passphrase only they would know keeps the gift for them.
To start one, see how to send a gift card with a message; the Christmas envelope is for the ones you won’t see until the new year.
Questions people ask
Can I send a gift card from any store?
Yes. Stampgoose doesn’t sell gift cards and isn’t tied to any shop. Buy an e-gift card, e-voucher or tickets wherever you like, have it emailed to you, then paste in the code, PIN or link, or add the voucher as a picture or PDF.
Can I schedule an e-gift card to arrive on a date?
Yes. Send the link early and set when the envelope opens, to the minute. Until then they see it sealed, with a countdown, and the gift inside stays wrapped.
Is it safe to send a gift card code by link?
The code is stored encrypted and stays out of the link preview, and it only shows once they’ve opened the envelope and pulled the ribbon. An envelope with a gift in it can’t be sent without a passphrase, and that’s deliberate: once it opens, whoever holds the link could otherwise use the code.
