Singapore women who taught international visitors how to haggle and never to accept a price tag at face value are succumbing to gentler western ways. They are taking to loyalty cards as keenly as jet-setters rush to the duty-free paradise’s computer and photography shops.
And this week, a Kansas City company, announced sales of their unique new cards to three major Singapore shops. And they gloated that 200,000 of these once very careful shoppers were now carrying the loyalty cards. That equals a massive 400,000 GraphiCard transactions each month, which brings S$12 million to the island’s tills. And this, says the Visible Results Group of Companies, is just the beginning. The cards are expected to become very big business.
It is not just up-market stores that are winning the once aggressive shoppers over. One of the new businesses is a shopping mall. “This,” said an official of Visible Results, “underscores the system's versatility and applicability to myriad markets.”
At City Link Mall, which admittedly hosts some well-known companies, thousands of people have already signed up to the City Shopper programme. The spokesman said, “Anchored by HMV Music, the underground mall houses over 50 stores, including Godiva Chocolatier, Pacific Coffee, Nike, Furla, 7-1l, Guardian pharmacy, H20 beauty products and French Connection.”
Another of the new businesses is the international firm, Bioskin, which operates three retail day spas in Singapore. The third participant is the Wing Tai Clothing, which is big in fashion shops. Other firms involved on the island are TopShop, with three stores; TopMan, and Dorothy Perkins, with two locations apiece, and Miss Selfridge, with six units.
Several non-competing merchants and consumer product manufacturers are teaming up with Wing Tai’s loyalty card in return for promotion. Participants to date include a cosmetics manufacturer, a jewellery chain, and a movie theatre chain group.
The cards don’t haggle for the customers in the old way, though they do win points. In many ways, it seems they are more of a fashion accessory. The Kansas City official said that users' cards are inserted into a point-of-sale terminal during each sales transaction. Points gained are actually displayed on the plastic, along with other details designed to flatter the customer.
“The data -- which is customized for each card -- can include offers, details of special promotions and sales, advertising, particulars of instant-win games and more. A rewrite able magnetic stripe, incorporated into the back of the card, stores specific data about transactions as they occur.
“This turns the card into a self-contained database that encourages repeated use, and fosters customer loyalty.”
About Visible Results
Meanwhile, results revealed in Auckland, New Zealand, show that the Visible Results Group of Companies has emerged as one of the world's leading customer relationship firms, serving a growing client base across the convenience, fast food, fuels and the general retail industry.
The company currently operates loyalty card programmes in eight countries, including the US, Australasia, Singapore, Japan, Spain, Columbia and China. Operators in several more countries are due to launch their first programs soon.
About three million people hold these loyalty cards, which are based on Visible Results' GraphiCard(TM) technology and CRM infrastructure. The cards show a lot of money changing hands – around US $21 million monthly.
