Starbucks is trying to turn their gift cards into a sort of pre-paid credit card, and it's working as far as I'm concerned. You can transfer funds from one card to another, which means you don't have to carry 300 Starbucks Gift Cards around if you receive them as gifts-- transfer all the money on to one card. Once the cards are registered on Starbucks.com, each purchase gets you a star-- no stars allows for a free drink on your birthday, five stars is the first level and thirty stars is the next. See the diagrams below. Not only is it a good deal, ( I was going to buy a drink on my birthday ANYWAY, but now it's free!) but if you need to get your coffee budget under control this is a way to control it-- it's prepaid, load it with as much as you think appropriate and then don't spend more than is on the card.
