Caution: You are now entering--THE REWARD ZONE

[WorkAtBBuy]

The Reward Zone Card--Our free point card. The equivalent of a Winn Dixie card, Publix card, the CVS card...any kinda frequent shopper card. Most people get that. But there are some who just...bug the bloody hell out of me.

Me: Do you have a reward zone card, sir? (this mostly happens with guys for some reason)
Him: No, and I don't want one.

....Ok. Do you even know what it is? Are you even gonna let me explain it? These fellows also seem to find "the catch" in everything. That's annoying, too. Then we have--

Me: Do you have a reward zone card, sir? (again, this mostly happens with guys)
Him: No.
Me: Would you like one today? It's our free point card.
Him: Ok sure.
Me: Ok....could I get a phone number, sir?
Him: Oh no. I don't give that out. You guys will sell my information to telemarketers and send me junk mail.
Me: No, we just use it to send your certificates.
Him: Whatever. I WON'T FALL FOR YOUR SCHEMES!
Me: *sigh*...

Or a variant

Me: Could I get that phone number?
Him/her: 706-blah, blah, blah
Me: Alrighty...and your address?
Him/her: What do you need that for?
Me: To send your certificates.
Him/her: Oh no! I'll get all kinds of junk mail!
Me:

Then you have the people who have it, but apparently didn't listen to what it was for when it was offered.

Him/Her: ...So what does this thing DO again?
Me: It gives you points on your purchases. After a certain number of points, we start to send you money back.
Him/Her: ...Oh. Do you know how many I have?
Me: ....*sigh*

And then

Me: Do you have a reward zone card?
Him/Her: Oh yeah. *hands it to me*
Me: *scans card*
Him/Her: ...What? No discount?
Me: *sigh* It's NOT a discount card. It's a point card. *insert spiel here*
Him/Her: Oh. What a waste.
Me:

[Luna]

You too? I am not alone! I posted a whole thread on my annoyance of frequent shopper cards but I can't find it now.

You forgot to mention the customers that claim they have been shopping for years/months/spent thousands of dollars in your store and have never ever been offered a frequent shoppers card before. Which, of course, you know isn't true b/c corporate freaks out when your enrollment rate is too low so you know everyone is asking to enroll people. If they didn't enroll, it's because they most likley (and probably rudely) said NO.

I also hate the line: "So what exactly does this DO for me?" *sigh* Maybe if you listened when you signed up, or read the brochure you'd know! Argh.

[Estil]

Actually, the customers you mentioned do have a point. I heard on the Michael Reagan radio talk show that that is the REAL reason corporations have loyality cards (why do you think my store is so anal about cashiers not using a "dummy card" if the customer doesn't have their card and their phone number won't bring it up?). In fact, as a cashier, I think our loyality card program is ****ing annoying to the customers (especially the out of town ones that are indirectly discriminated against; since they don't have our store in their area, don't want to bother with the card and are thus forced to not get the sale prices). There is no reason why we should be forcing customers to have a gimmick card (as I sometimes call it) just to get our sale prices. No other retailers I know of make you have the card just to get the sale prices. Now, if they just drop the "required to have card for sale prices" and keep everything else about it (accumilate fuel discounts, get coupons in the mail) it'd be okay. If my store was truely serious about "Customer First Strategy", they would NOT be forcing customers to have a stupid card to get the sale prices.

[ShinyGreenApple]

I work for the 'beef people', so I'm asking for the reward card probably no less than a hundred times a day. While most of my customers have them already, and it's not hard to get them to sign up for one, I frankly can't see the point in all these 'customer reward card' gimmicks.

Let's see, anyone can get a card.

Store prices are ridiculously high if you don't have one, but again, most people do.

Why not just hack the prices on the shelf and do away with the card altogether?

[Shabo]

*Dons marketing cap*

The rewards/frequent shoppers cards do many things, actually. When they were first implemented, they provided the few stores that were using them with a loyalty incentive for the customers to return to their store versus shopping at a competitor.

Now, every store you shop at has their own rewards cards. Most offer incentives such as free items for frequently purchased things. They no longer offer loyalty incentives unless there is some great reward for shopping there frequently, such as randomly generated coupons or free items after a certain number purchased. However, these are usually so small that they no longer matter to most consumers.

Today's electronic incentive cards are used to gather data about what people are purchasing. Ever notice how the coupons that you get at the supermarket are correlated to what you purchase frequently? They store the data and generate coupons for items that relate to what you purchase, hence improving on your customer experience. Most companies also use this information to determine how to better market to their customers, which may or may not creep people out, but that's life. Some companies do send flyers and various coupons to your home, but most junk mail you get is just because your address and name are listed in the phone book.

There are companies that devote their time and resources to compiling lists of people that are alike in different ways, then sell these lists to other companies to be used for marketing plans. These lists can cost anywhere from a few thousand to several thousand dollars (US), depending on how detailed the company wants to get. That's where the junk mail comes from. Mailings are a fast way to get information out to many many people, even though they have a ridiculously low response rate. So signing up for that rewards card probably won't make a difference, especially not from large national retailers that are happy to get free information from you and wouldn't want to ruin that chance by selling your data.

*Marketing cap placed back on shelf*

BBuy rewards zone cards are free now?!?! Since when?!?!?

[protege]

I have quite a few loyalty cards from various places. The best though, is the Giant Eagle (or Jyunt Iggle, if you're from Pittsburgh!) Advantage Card. For every $10 you spend on groceries, you get 10 cents off per gallon of gas at one of their Get-Go stations. With gas slightly less than $3 a gallon lately, I love it. Last year was the best though. Anyone want to guess what I paid at the pump? A whopping 17 cents a gallon Seriously, I filled up my tank for around $2 total!

With that said, I draw the line at giving out personal details at some places. For example, Radio Shack once asked for address and phone numbers. Now I don't know about you, but is that *really* necessary to buy a 9-volt battery

[queenbb]

I have quite a few loyalty cards from various places. The best though, is the Giant Eagle (or Jyunt Iggle, if you're from Pittsburgh!) Advantage Card. For every $10 you spend on groceries, you get 10 cents off per gallon of gas at one of their Get-Go stations. With gas slightly less than $3 a gallon lately, I love it. Last year was the best though. Anyone want to guess what I paid at the pump? A whopping 17 cents a gallon Seriously, I filled up my tank for around $2 total!

With that said, I draw the line at giving out personal details at some places. For example, Radio Shack once asked for address and phone numbers. Now I don't know about you, but is that *really* necessary to buy a 9-volt battery

i soo want that card, even though gas prices out here are for some reason lower than they are in nebraska, (i told my mom i paid 2.90 the other day and she says well i just paid 3.24, to which i replied "no simpaty for yu" cause for the last few years i have had to pay considerably more for gas than they did out there)

but who knows how long that will last

i always figured it was to gather data so they will keep my favorite stuff on the shelfs. because im a perticular person and i like to make sure that i have some things, and i even had those things shipped in from other places cause they had them there and not here, which i complain about on a regular basis and now they are here and not there (my mom is thankful since she is tired of shipping me powdered yellow cheese sprinkles and purple poweraide every 6 months or so)

[mrtauntaun]

The reward zone cards have been free for about a year now, IIRC.
Personally, I love my reward zone card. I shop at Best Buy all the time. If BB wants to give me money for something I am already doing anyway, I say more power to them.

[air914]

Man you have to spend $100 here to get $0.10 off your gas..... is that right, every $10 you get money off gas? Or was that a typo??

It's funny when I get those coupons in the mail - sometimes it's stuff I've never purchased - or it's a competitor's product - different brand than the one I buy...... which is a little weird - if you see me buy the same brand over and over and over do you really think your little 10% off when you buy 10 coupon is going to make me change?? Well at least for me it's not going to make me change - especially when you have to buy several items to get the discount - if you really want me to try the competitor's product - give me one item free .

[Ill_Used_Heroine]

I remember when Waldenbooks got their Preferred Reader card. In the beginning they gave people 65+ a Lifetime card if they signed up and paid the $10. Oh man, sure didn't take Corporate long to realize that mistake

So, it ended up they were making more money selling the cards than anything else, and then our Performance Reviews and raises depended on how many cards we sold. I hated that crap!

Actually, my original manager posted her card number on all the registers and told the employees to use that number if the customers didn't have theirs or didn't want to purchase the card. I think I was the only one who refused to do that, and she kept trying to get me to use my card number like that ... I was like, no f'ing way! So, she really racked up the points and got TONS of $5 certificates. Oh yeah, they finally caught her and she was so outta there! tee hee We got a way better manager, after she was gone.

[WorkAtBBuy]

*Dons marketing cap*

The rewards/frequent shoppers cards do many things, actually. When they were first implemented, they provided the few stores that were using them with a loyalty incentive for the customers to return to their store versus shopping at a competitor.

Now, every store you shop at has their own rewards cards. Most offer incentives such as free items for frequently purchased things. They no longer offer loyalty incentives unless there is some great reward for shopping there frequently, such as randomly generated coupons or free items after a certain number purchased. However, these are usually so small that they no longer matter to most consumers.

Today's electronic incentive cards are used to gather data about what people are purchasing. Ever notice how the coupons that you get at the supermarket are correlated to what you purchase frequently? They store the data and generate coupons for items that relate to what you purchase, hence improving on your customer experience. Most companies also use this information to determine how to better market to their customers, which may or may not creep people out, but that's life. Some companies do send flyers and various coupons to your home, but most junk mail you get is just because your address and name are listed in the phone book.

There are companies that devote their time and resources to compiling lists of people that are alike in different ways, then sell these lists to other companies to be used for marketing plans. These lists can cost anywhere from a few thousand to several thousand dollars (US), depending on how detailed the company wants to get. That's where the junk mail comes from. Mailings are a fast way to get information out to many many people, even though they have a ridiculously low response rate. So signing up for that rewards card probably won't make a difference, especially not from large national retailers that are happy to get free information from you and wouldn't want to ruin that chance by selling your data.

*Marketing cap placed back on shelf*

BBuy rewards zone cards are free now?!?! Since when?!?!?

Those cards have been free since 04 or 05. And we don't send junk mail with the Rewawrd Zone cards. You only get junk mail if you get magazines...which is another rant entirely.

[Namrepus221]

I have quite a few loyalty cards from various places. The best though, is the Giant Eagle (or Jyunt Iggle, if you're from Pittsburgh!) Advantage Card. For every $10 you spend on groceries, you get 10 cents off per gallon of gas at one of their Get-Go stations. With gas slightly less than $3 a gallon lately, I love it. Last year was the best though. Anyone want to guess what I paid at the pump? A whopping 17 cents a gallon Seriously, I filled up my tank for around $2 total!

With that said, I draw the line at giving out personal details at some places. For example, Radio Shack once asked for address and phone numbers. Now I don't know about you, but is that *really* necessary to buy a 9-volt battery

Believe it or not I've been accused to stealing fuel using my advantage card.

We spend so much at Giant eagle on groceries that we get a HUGE discount whenever we buy fuel. Literally our fill ups will end up being roughly 2 cents that we have to pay because that's what's not covered by the card.

So my brother has a 1995 Ford Explorer and we go for a fuel up before a trip to the mall. We use the card and end up having to go in to pay 2 pennies for a full fuel up for the truck.

I walk in to pay and the cashier is dumbfounded that all of the gas is only costing us 2 cents. calls her manager and I hear her whisper to him that we musta done something to the pump and if she could call the police.

The manager asks if we had an advantage card, I said yes. he took the two pennies and let us leave. Apparently the girl was new and had never seen someone get that much of a discount off an advantage card before.

[WorkAtBBuy]

Actually, the customers you mentioned do have a point. I heard on the Michael Reagan radio talk show that that is the REAL reason corporations have loyality cards (why do you think my store is so anal about cashiers not using a "dummy card" if the customer doesn't have their card and their phone number won't bring it up?). In fact, as a cashier, I think our loyality card program is ****ing annoying to the customers (especially the out of town ones that are indirectly discriminated against; since they don't have our store in their area, don't want to bother with the card and are thus forced to not get the sale prices). There is no reason why we should be forcing customers to have a gimmick card (as I sometimes call it) just to get our sale prices. No other retailers I know of make you have the card just to get the sale prices. Now, if they just drop the "required to have card for sale prices" and keep everything else about it (accumilate fuel discounts, get coupons in the mail) it'd be okay. If my store was truely serious about "Customer First Strategy", they would NOT be forcing customers to have a stupid card to get the sale prices.

The Reward Zone card is good at any Best Buy nation wide. So no descrimintaiton there. We don't base the prices on the card because it's just a point card. Very rarely we might offer some DVDs at a certain sale price with the card, but that's rare.

[protege]

Man you have to spend $100 here to get $0.10 off your gas..... is that right, every $10 you get money off gas? Or was that a typo??

Whoops...my bad! It's actually $50. Apparently I can't type today. $50 will get you 10c off per gallon.

[Geek King]

I have filled out a loyalty card in the name of my cat just to see if they did sell the info to anyone. I was amused when my little hairball got a free Mach 3 razor in the mail.