Boston-based startup Nift has raised $16.5 million in a Series A to fund its platform for “business gift cards,” a way for local businesses to drive customer engagement by providing gift cards to their consumers.

The company, which announced its funding round last week, allows its business clients to provide their customers with a “special” gift card: those customers then enter that code into Nift’s website, where they can then choose a gift from another local business.

The aim of the service, which was started in 2014, is to allow these smaller businesses to stay competitive against services like Amazon, founder and CEO for Nift — short for “neighborhood gift” — Elery Pfeffer told TechCrunch.

In the company’s native Boston, 250,000 customers have activated more than 500,000 of its cards, the company told TechCrunch. Spark Capital was the leader of this round of funding, which brings the company’s total equity to $19.5 million, according to Crunchbase.

Read more at TechCrunch, Boston Business Journal, and Crunchbase.