Secondary Marketplace Cardpool is now offering gift cards that can be used on their site, to purchase gift cards.

That is, two levels in indirection to a recipient actually getting a gift.

From a economical standpoint, this makes sense.

If you wanted to give your gift recipient as much choice in what gift they actually got, you could buy them an open-loop gift card, like American Express or Visa, but those come saddled with fees (yes, even after the new federal gift card laws) and are hard to spend the last few bucks.  Worse.

Or, you could give them a Cardpool gift card where they could buy a gift card from a retailer of their choice, at a discount, and likely be able to spend it all.  Better.

But as a gift, it is a horrible idea.  If a gift card tells a recipient that you weren’t willing to take the time to actually pick a gift for them, a gift card gift card (should I trademark that term?) says you weren’t even willing to take the time to pick a retailer they might like.

It’s a toss up.

I usually stick to actual gifts, unless it is a teenager that is in to music, an I get them an iTunes gift card.