Stamps or points: how to choose, and how to set it up

Three ways a card can count

Stamps count scans: one stamp each time staff scan the card, toward a reward you name. Nothing is typed, and the card reads at a glance.

Points per visit work the same way at the counter: a fixed number of points per scan, with no amount entered. They leave room for rewards at more than one level of points.

Points per dollar follow the bill. Staff enter the amount, so a large order earns more than a small one.

Each program is one kind, chosen when you create it. To change kinds later, you archive the program and create a new one; the history stays with the old program.

When a stamp card is the right call

• Most of what you sell costs about the same: a coffee, a slice, a lunch special.
• You want staff to scan and move on, with nothing to type at the busiest moment.
• You want the reward to feel close and countable: customers see exactly how many visits are left.
• Your regulars already know paper punch cards.

When points are the right call

• Orders vary a lot, a coffee next to a family order, and you want a big order to earn like a big order.
• You want more than one reward on the card, from a small item to a larger one.
• Staff can enter the amount in a second because it's right there on the receipt or the terminal.

How far away the first reward should be

Close. In a 2006 study of a real café's reward card, Kivetz, Urminsky and Zheng found that customers bought coffee more often the closer they got to the free one.

A reward that is months away gives customers little reason to come sooner. Set the first one so a regular reaches it within a few weeks of normal visits, and put anything bigger after it.

We set this up with you, from your menu and your regulars' habits.

What to give, and what to avoid

Start with something small that customers don't usually buy: a pastry with the coffee, a drink with the slice, a side with the meal. It costs you far less than its menu price, and it puts something new in front of them.

Keep the main item, the free coffee or the free slice, for the top of the card, if you offer it at all.

Avoid a percentage off. A discount applies to the whole ticket every time it's redeemed, so it costs you on what the customer was going to buy anyway.

When many orders are small

A stamp or a per-visit point pays the same for a bottle of water as for a full lunch. If small orders are common at your counter, there are two answers.

Points per dollar, so a small order earns little. Or a minimum purchase, which works with every kind: with points per dollar, purchases below it earn nothing, and with stamps or per-visit points, staff confirm the purchase reaches it before the scan counts.

Questions before you pick

We set it up with you

We set your program and rewards up, launch it at your counter with your staff, and then run it for you: you tell us what you want, we make the changes. You keep full access to the merchant app and the web dashboard, and you can reach us whenever something needs to change.