While it’s still very early days for the Woodlands Local Rewards Club, we’re already starting to see some truly astonishing results emerging with our members spending 43% more than non-members.
by Antony Begley
It’s not unfair to say that the first couple of months of having the Woodlands Local Rewards Club (WLRC) running in the store have been challenging, but we’re already beginning to see some fascinating data emerge. The latest, frankly astonishing stat, is that WLRC members spend an average of £7.08 per transaction; that compares to the standard non-member figure of £4.94.
Or to put it another way, Members spend 43% more than non-members every time they visit the store!
Let’s be clear: the base here is very, very small so we’re absolutely not getting carried away yet, but the fact remains that members seem to be spending far more than non-members.
Teething issues
Stats like those serve to re-energise our commitment to the Rewards Club as a key spoke of our strategy going forward. The challenges so far have indeed been significant, although this was almost entirely down to issues relating to getting the EPoS system and the Darius shopper engagement system that powers the WLRC to talk to each other efficiently and well.
Integrating software systems that have never been integrated before was always going to be a challenge and to be fair to our EPoS provider Retail Solutions and to Velocity Worldwide, the people behind Darius, they have worked tirelessly to tackle every issue that has arisen.
Velocity in particular has been an impressively enthusiastic and committed partner in this project and has pushed the Woodlands Local and SLR teams to hit some very demanding goals in just a couple of months.
What’s next?
A recent roundtable saw a big contingent from Velocity and Woodlands gather to plan the next quarter’s marketing activity as we endeavour to keep rewarding members, and keep incentivising non-members to join. It’s a relentless and complex task which requires us to have four or five marketing messages active at any one point on time, every week of the year.
But with the great results we’re already starting to see, it’s very clear that the WLRC could be the beginning of something very big indeed.
