Why do people by gift cards for kids?

Today I needed to buy an emergency Chanukah gift. When I got to the mall I was amazed at how many last-minute Chanukah shoppers were there (yes, I realize that they were almost all Christmas ingrates - people who want to return gifts because they think they can do better).

So, I go in the KB Toys. There were about 100 people, 3 employees and at least 5 or 6 toys. I heard several of the customers asking if the store was going out of business. Clearly, the company strategy was not to restock anything after 12/20.

...but here were all of these teary eyed kids clutching a gift card in one hand and a "Tooth Time Kelly" doll in the other. A little boy was saying, "I want to get a remote control car". The dad said, "can you think of anything else" and the boy sobbed, "that was already my 8th choice."

This seemed to be the issue: these kids all got gift cards for Christmas. Twenty-four hours later they are tired of playing with the cards and would like a toy. Then here they are, parents in tow having a miserable time. They seemed to fall into one of two categories:

1) Disgusted - they realize that all of the good toys (along with the fine toys and marginal toys) are long gone. They are now asking to hit the food court to drown their sorrows in ice cream and sugared pretzels.

2) desperate - they insist on their parents making yet another full loop around the 10' x 10' store, or maybe dad should climb to the top of the self, or if mom would just crawl on her hands and knees to see if the box in the back were different then the 3 in front.

The thing they all had in common is that they were cursing the genius that thought a gift card to a toy store was a good idea.