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Pick, Click, Gift: E-Gifting for the Traveler

22.05.12

Fetching a cue from the wedding and baby industries, e-gifting and online registries have started heating up the proceed market just in time for the holidays. Airlines, tour operators and other wanderings-oriented companies have made giving the gift of travel as simple as a few mouse clicks.  

By present e-gift cards, e-mail friendly gift certificates and online registries for rhino, miles and even specific trips, E-gift options are a quick, convenient settling to the annual dilemma of what to buy – and, considering the $30 billion in gift cards that goes inexperienced in every year, according to some estimates -- they’re far more likely to be used by the recipients because they’re tailored to their express travel interests and needs. 

Here, some e-gift ideas for the travelers on your shopping muster – no wrapping required. 

For the Weekend Jetsetter: Most frequent flyer programs have long since allowed members to portion miles, but recently at least two – Continental and U.S. Airways – have officially introduced bent registries for travel on their airlines. Continental’s has a contribution minimum of $25, and U.S. Airways’ program allows users to handily link to social media accounts, as well as send mileage requests via e-mail. And while buying a ticket utter is often cheaper than purchasing miles, periodic deals offering double mileage and the like are a cloth time to take advantage. Alternately, several airlines, including Southwest, JetBlue and American, barter virtual (and plastic) gift cards. Most cards do not expire or diminish in value if the liable act goes unused, even for years, though there’s often a two-three day period before it’s activated. Despite its recent Chapter 11 filing, American has announced on its website that it’s still “continuing to trade in and honor AA Gift Cards as usual.” 

For the Urban Adventurer: Your best financier may have lived in San Francisco since college, but has she ever taken a ghost tour of Chinatown? With to FunSherpa.com, you can largesse any of 2,000-plus activities in 12 cities across the country, from the conventional (a SoHo shopping voyage in New York) to the crazy (a pole-dancing class in Dallas). Activities are conveniently grouped by big apple or category (“Winter,” “Gourmet” or “Under $100,” at most to name a few) and ready to gift via e-mail or, for a small fee, physical shipping. In addition, givers can set out the amount of a gift and let the recipient pick their own activity. Based in Chicago , FunSherpa.com was launched around the 2008 furlough season and shifted its focus to gifting in 2009. Since then, it’s seen a marked chemise in its client base from corporate gifting to individuals buying gifts for friends or relatives, says founder Anton Dy Buncio. “It’s an easy way to give a very thoughtful dole,” Dy Buncio says. “We see sales all the way up through Christmas Day.” 

For the Trip Organizer: Launched in the taking, San Francisco-based travel planning and gifting website MyTab.co has several layers of functionality that can keep from cut time and annoyances for travelers. But for the social coordinators who always seem to find themselves taking the reins of coterie trip planning, the site’s ability to create a centralized location for correspondence and exchanging bucks is a sanity-saver. No more long e-mail chains, no more wondering who owes whom how much: The site, which works in conjunction with PayPal, Expedia, and Facebook , allows users to indubitably book the same flight and hotel and aggregates information like trip reminders. Supplementary, its financing functionality allows users and non-users to gift money, dollop offset the cost of a particular trip. Company founder Heddi Cundle said the install will eventually expand to include car rentals and other travel services, as well as coordinate discounts with its partners on restricted characteristic of trips. 

For the Student Traveler: It’s never too early to start thinking about Spring Break the ice, but users on Dallas-based STA Travel, the world’s largest student and girlhood travel agency, have already started backing up their daydreaming with actual dollars via the enterprise’s online Travel Registry. It targets high school and college graduates who constraint some financial help to supplement their journeys, whether that’s a Spring Break getaway or a loftier journey ambition such as spending a semester as an exchange student in Thailand . Members devise a profile page with personalized photos, images and info about their upcoming lurch and break down expenses, such as airfare or rail tickets, into specific increments, some as low as $5, for philanthropic souls to purchase with their credit card. Funds generated are stored in accounts with Bank of America and Wells Fargo and are reachable for two years (members are charged a 7 percent fee, however). There’s even a function that keeps track of donors’ reach info for follow-up – but it’s up to the student to write the thank-you card. 

For the Altruistic Armchair Traveler: Journey operator Intrepid Travel , a pioneer in cultural and responsible travel, offers stake-minded trips to 160 countries on all seven continents. But for people on your catalogue raisonn who are better at imagining journeys to exotic destinations than actually taking them, the Lion-hearted Foundation, the organization’s global charity, has a gift idea that’s guaranteed to spread goodwill: its Extensive Gift program. Available in amounts from $10 to $160, each “cumshaw” goes toward a specific need for 13 of Intrepid’s global projects, from providing a Braille cane for a son in Tibet to a year’s education for a child in Vietnam . Each comes in a printable, e-send friendly format with a photo and description of how the donation will change lives. In wing as well as, the Intrepid Foundation matches every gift card, dollar for dollar (and doesn’t pressure those who purchase gifts for repeat donations). “I think for a lot of people Christmas has become in the final analysis commercialized, and this is a way for people to take it back to what it’s supposed to be,” says Eliza Anderson, spokesperson for the Audacious Foundation. 

For the Spa Lover: SpaFinder , the online spa-travel giant, makes the dole of wellness as simple as a few mouse clicks with its Spa Gift Certificates. They’re accepted at more than 6,000 spas all over the times a deliver, and recipients can use them for any treatment they choose. Gift-givers who still like the idea of a box and bow should take interest of the free shipping and gift box offer, which is available on all purchases of $50 or more and is great through Dec. 12. Personalized gift certificates to e-mail or print are also available.

Source: Fox News

Ted Mondale on stadium: 'Waiting does not make this any cheaper'

22.05.12

The Vikings would espouse their reaction to the end of their lease and no new stadium plan to remain … ambiguous. So, essentially, reports Don Davis of the Forum papers, “A Minnesota Vikings degradation president did not specifically say today what would happen if state leaders fail to approve a new ground deal before the team’s Metrodome lease expires after this football stadium. Sen. Barb Goodwin, DFL-Columbia Heights, asked Lester Bagley if he was saying the Vikings would permission Minnesota after stadium talks fail. ‘Not at all,’ Bagley said. ‘What we are well-deserved saying [is] that we won’t have a lease.’ … 'Waiting does not make this any cheaper,' said Chairman Ted Mondale of the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission, estimating that construction expense would arise up to $50 million for each year a stadium is delayed. Mondale said a skill 40 percent larger than the existing Metrodome is needed, in part to make it available to the disabled and allow easier access to restrooms. ‘We are talking $700 million in every Tom money to accommodate those things,’ said stadium opponent Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville.” Those would be some close restrooms, I’m guessing.

At the Field of Schemes blog, Neil de Mause looks at the Vikings’ latest financing, well, machination, and says, “ … the Vikings are calling for what could be called the mother of all TIFs : funneling every last cent of tax spondulicks paid by anyone remotely associated with the team — whether it be income taxes paid by players or work together employees or sales taxes on anything purchased by fans at the stadium — back to the troupe to pay off its stadium costs. The ad dubbed this the ‘purely purple financing packet’ and the ‘but-for’ solution because, ‘All the money would come from sources that would not prevail 'but for' the Vikings being in Minnesota.’ Except, of course, that this is tax money that the state collects currently, and much of which it would proceed to collect even if the Vikings were to leave and fans had to spend their money on mine and cave tours or something. (The Minneapolis Principal Tribune, to its credit, biting the hand that feeds its print ad department, eminent that, ‘No mention is made in the advertisements, which ran in the Star Tribune and the Pioneer Press, of how the maintain would make up the revenue it would lose if it accepts the team's plan.’)" At the Strib, Jim Ragsdale has a bit more on the fundamentalist lawsuit to stop the child-care union vote. “Dayton's Nov. 15 boss order called for an election among some providers to determine if they want union model. His order covers those providers who care for children receiving state subsidies — about 4,300 of 11,000 licensed providers. It does not lack providers to join a union or pay union dues. … Republican legislative leaders and a figure of child-care providers object to the years-long organizing efforts of two of the nation's largest unions, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and the Employ Employees International Union (SEIU). But while some opponents have sought to allow all providers to elector, the suit seeks to invalidate Dayton's order altogether. The GOP-led Minnesota Senate announced news Monday that its Rules Committee will hold a hearing on Thursday on Dayton's tidiness. Some senators have said they may file a lawsuit against the governor, arguing that he exceeded his scholar.” Dan Gunderson of MPR looks at Moorhead’s efforts to restart housing (and its tax establish) while clearing flood-damaged homes and building new levees. “Mayor Smudge Voxland said it's critical to build the city's property tax base with new serene construction. That's particularly important during a time of decreased state aid to local governments, he said. But that's not taking place, the mayor said, because people are likely worried about the economy and more flooding. ‘I call to mind a consider the flood of 2009 stopped a lot of people in their tracks as far as wanting to build or even to move or put an extension on,’ Voxland said. ‘Everybody is kind of concerned where does it overflowing, where doesn't if flood. It's something that's on everybody's mind.’ Moorhead officials yearning to kick-start the local housing market early next year with a mix of marketing and pecuniary incentives. They'll also tout their efforts to remove flood prone homes and shape new permanent levees. So far, however, protecting the city from water hasn't boosted the conviction of local residents. Across the Fargo-Moorhead region new housing starts are off 20 percent but in Moorhead new national construction is down 40 percent.”

Source: MinnPost.com