Brits Love Loyalty Cards

According to a recent government survey, us Brits love loyalty cards. 

Well, they didn't ask for my opinion, I do not love loyalty cards. I don't even like them. 

There's nothing loyal about the relationship between the British shops who offer loyalty cards, and their customers.

Loyalty cards are in no way beneficial to consumers. Consumers who have been sucked in to believing the loyalty cards are helping them to get more for their money. I guess that's what successful marketing and advertising can do. 

Big business is in no way interested in giving its customers value for money. Loyalty cards; those awful pieces of plastic that take up too much space in your purse or wallet, are all a big con. 

Surely people realise that loyalty cards don't really give them anything for free. 

It's obvious that to make it appear as though the customers are receiving a benefit of some sort, the businesses simply raise the price of the items they allocate points on, or on other items in their shops. They're not going to let anything affect their profits. 

Another thing I don't like about loyalty cards is the fact that they are yet another way for 'Big Brother' to spy on us. 

They know every item you purchase, when you shop, how you shop, and where you shop. They can gather so much information about you, just by your use of a loyalty card. 

There are those people who say, 'If you've got nothing to hide, why do you care?" But that's really not the point, and no doubt the people who use this argument wouldn't dream of sitting in their lounge with no curtains at the windows so everyone could see exactly what they were doing. So why do they think it's acceptable for companies to either use for themselves, or sell our personal information? 

To those people who say, if you've got nothing to hide...... I say, it's not about hiding your information, it's about privacy.

 

Anyway, here's want the government survey reported:

Three quarters (76%) of consumers said they have between 1 and 5 loyalty cards that they always carry with them. 

But, 1 in 4 (40%) said remembering to carry the loyalty cards with them was inconvenient. 

And a quarter (22%) said they often forgot to carry their loyalty cards with them. 

A total of 68% of consumers said they disliked two things about loyalty cards.

One, time limits on offers. Two, restrictions on offers. 

The most popular redemption offers were stated as; 42% of consumers said they liked accumulating the points to cash them in at a later date. While 31% said they used them for purchasing essentials. And 31% said they used their points for purchasing treats. 

Other results of the survey showed that 20% of consumers preferred to cash in their points at the earliest opportunity. And 8% stated a preference for receiving instant discounts at the till. 

According to this survey 32% of consumers said they would happily provide extra information about their shopping habits and profile, in return for extra points. 

The government survey also concluded that loyalty schemes are currently so popular because British shoppers are thrifty. According to the survey, 66% of those questioned agreed, or strongly agreed with this statement, "I am more price-conscious than one year ago". 

A third (36%) of consumers said they are using loyalty cards and coupons more than they they were a year ago. Almost half (48%) of the people surveyed agreed or strongly agreed with this statement, "I am more carful to remember my loyalty cards and coupons when I go shopping". 

I wonder who first came up with the idea of loyalty cards, as we know them today? No doubt that person has made millions, or more likely billions of pounds for the companies who hand out loyalty cards like sweets; something nice for us to be pleased about, and to enjoy. 

I am mainly referring to supermarkets in this blog post, because they are the biggest offenders of abusing their customers via loyalty cards. Although I know other businesses also have loyalty card schemes. 

Having said that, I guess I should mention that not all of the supermarkets in Britain have loyalty card schemes. Asda doesn't, and neither do Aldi and Lidl. Thankfully those are the 3 places we do the bulk of our food shopping, so at least we don't get asked, "Do you have a loyalty card, and if not, would you like one?" every time we get to the till. 

I remember fondly the 'old days' when you could go in to a shop and not be bombarded with in-your-face and aggressive offers. You were free to browse the goods for sale, check the price, and then if you so wished purchase your chosen product. Shopping was much more straight forward, and far less stressful than it is today. 

Now days, it's often so difficult to even figure out how much an item is. And as for comparing the price of one brand with the same product of a different brand - forget it. 

I don't like shopping. I don't want to spend any longer than necessary in a shop. I have much better things to do with my time than to stand querying prices and weights on every single item in the shop. 

Big business does everything possible to make this almost impossible, or so frustrating that you just grab a product randomly and sling it in your basket or trolley. 

The prices on the shelves are never standardised. Some will have price per gram, others per ml, and various other measurements. It's ridiculous. 

They obviously do not want their customers to be easily able to work out what's the best buy for them, which actually does not always mean the cheapest. 

I'm fed up of seeing supposedly generous offers of 'buy one, get one free', or 'buy three for the price of two' etc. I don't want 3. I just want one! 

No wonder it's also been reported that the average British household throws away nearly 50% of it's grocery shopping. We're being forced to buy way more than we need, or want. 

But what do the supermarkets care? They are coining it in, literally. They make millions just from the stuff we chuck in the bin. And then they make even more money from us because our fridges, freezers, cupboards are empty so we need to buy more. We've run out of everything because it either went off before we could eat it, because we'd bought too much, or we've throw it in the bin because we realised we didn't actually need 3 of whatever was on offer the day we shopped. 

Unfortunately I doubt we'll ever see the dearh of loyalty cards because they are too valuable a tool for gathering information about us. And as we all know, it's the supermarkets who really run this country, not the government, and information is power. And power equals money.  

Grrr! I realise I have slightly wandered off topic in this post about Brits love of loyalty cards, to my serious dislike of supermarkets, but I couldn't help it. It's a subject I often can't stop myself from having a rant about. 

So, back to loyalty cards, basically as I think you'll have gathered - I'm not a fan. That's why when I read that three quarters of Brits love them, I was quite surprised. And slightly concerned. 

Surprised, because I often hear people in shops moaning about loyalty cards, and I've never heard anyone saying they like them, or anything positive about them. 

Concerned, because it says a lot about the education system in this country if people genuinely believe that loyalty cards are beneficial to them in any way. 

One last thing before I get sidetracked again, as I was writing this post, something popped in to my head, the saying, 'Lies, damned lies, and statistics'. Which probably explains why the figures quoted in this government survey don't make sense and aren't exactly accurate, or maybe that's also down to the education system in Britain. ;) 

What's your opinion?

Do you like loyalty cards? If so, I'd be interested to hear why you like them.