Gift Certificate Template

A gift certificate is the one piece of paper a small business hands over that the customer will hand to someone else, so it has to look like the business, not like a coupon. Most of the free ones are a word-processor table with a border from the clip-art drawer and a line that says "Value: $____" for someone to fill in with a pen. This one is drawn like the certificate it is: your name at the top, the value set large in a real serif, and the small print small, in a frame that sits inside the margin a home printer can reach. It is for the studio, the salon, the cafe, the tutor and the shop that sells a dozen of these in December.

The page reads the way the person opening it reads it. Your business at the top, with a logo above the name if you have one. Then "gift certificate", then the value, which can be an amount or the thing itself: $50, or one hour of massage, or a loaf a week. A line under it says what it is good for. Then To and From on two lines, set for a pen or typed. Along the foot, the expiry date, the code and your terms, each small and labeled.

The customizer refuses a value that does not fit the line. Twenty-four characters fill it at full size; the download waits until it fits. The business name and both name lines work the same way. Every other gift certificate maker will let you print one with the value cut off at the frame.

Three frames, because a gift certificate does different jobs. Classic is a double rule, the one people picture. Modern is a heavy bar down the left. Plain has no frame at all, for pre-printed stock or a look that is all type. Six color themes, with a gilt that is the default here because that is what a gift looks like, and a light-ink theme for the batch that goes through the office printer.

Print it at 100%, not fit to page, on heavier stock: 65 lb cover, about 176 gsm, goes through most home printers and feels like something worth giving. The free version is this design with the sample business and a small credit line at the foot, so you can see it on paper before you decide. The paid version carries your business, your logo, the value, the names, the date, the code and your terms, all six themes and all three frames, and comes back in Letter and A4 from one purchase, with a link that works for a year.