OC Chamber announces Gift Card Programs

The holidays will be here before you know it and with that in mind, the Oconee County Chamber of Commerce announces new programs in an effort to increase local shopping. Oconee County Chamber executive director Jillian Lusk tells about a new partnership with GiftCards.com. “We just made a new partnership with GiftCards.com, which is the largest online gift card merchant. We all know when you don’t know what to get somebody, you think of a gift card. Well, if somebody is from a different community they usually just go to big box stores but GiftCards.com is trying to turn that into a local program. Therefore, as long as you know the zip code, if you have family from out of town and they want to get you something, they could type in the zip code or city and it will pull up all the local merchants that they can now buy gift cards through. All of our membership has the opportunity to join that program on GiftCards.com for free and have their own individualized website and they would get proceeds from that. It is a Discover card program, so that might limit some of our merchants.” The Oconee County Chamber is also working on a local merchants’ gift card program as well, adds Lusk. “We are working out the kinks now for a community card that would be a card that somebody could use at any of our Chamber member’s businesses. So, they would have to opt into the program, we are not just going to throw people in and you start seeing a community card.” To learn more about the new gift card programs, call the Oconee County Chamber at 864-882-2097.