Gift cards have become the most popular gift given today. Instead of tirelessly shopping for someone, not knowing what to get them, you can simply buy a gift card, and that person can purchase their own gift. Consumer gift cards were a billion dollar industry in 2010, and this number keeps rising year by year. Gift certificates were once very popular, but the age of technology has since seen the gift card take over. With store gift cards, a merchant can track all of the activity, and mitigate any risk in regards to receiving a fake gift certificate.
Fast Merchant Advance, along with serving as a premier alternative business finance company, is also a premier gift card provider to merchants in the US today. We have gift card programs that can work with any type of business, including restaurant gift cards, retail store gift cards, or even personal service gift cards for things like massage and spa treatments.
We have introductory gift card packages that are no brainers for today’s merchant. Our introductory gift card package provides a merchant with 50 free custom designed gift cards, the equipment needed to process gift card sales, and marketing materials to display anywhere a merchant would like. Once a merchant has fully used their first round of cards, they can re-order a larger batch of cards at a very low cost. The gift cards are re-usable after a customer has fully depleted the gift card funds, simply re-load and resell to another customer! The program pays for itself in a short time. With the “breakage” on gift cards, this creates a whole new stream of revenue for a business. Breakage is defined as the money that is loaded onto gift cards, but never actually redeemed. The average breakage is generally in the neighborhood of 5 – 7% of the total gift card value.
Another great value added service Fast Merchant Advance provides is Loyalty and Stored Value cards. These are redemption based programs that offer a reward for a large purchase, frequent shopper, or VIP customer. We’ve all seen the primitive version of these. A customer walks into a coffee house, and collects a punch card, after that person buys 10 coffees, and receives 10 punches, the next one is on the house. The same theory applies here, with a twist. A merchant can set different tiers for their program, which offers their customers more than 1 way to receive benefits. An example would be, if a customer spent $20 at a restaurant, they would get a free appetizer, if they spent $50, they would get a free dessert, and if they spent $100, they would receive a free entrée. These tiers are all pre-set by the merchant, and can represent any reward they would like to offer.
We suggest that each merchant who is interested in starting their very own gift card or loyalty card program, opt to do both of these services. Not only are they a fantastic way of adding a new revenue stream to a merchant’s bottom line, it’s also a great way to drive new business directly to the merchant in the form of dollars that can only be spent there. Please review the gift card page on our website, or contact us anytime at 800-582-4953. We’ll be happy to assist you establishing a Gift and Loyalty Card program that works for your business.
