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Supermarket loyalty schemes are ramping up with new partnerships, boosted rewards and additional points for shoppers who ditch the traditional plastic card and download the app.
Today Countdown takes a step further in its rebranding to Woolworths as it launches the Everyday Rewards programme.
The new bright orange card or mobile app means the end for Onecard - Countdown’s 20-year-old reward programme.
Woolworths NZ said the new discount and reward programme was easy to understand with $1 spent at the supermarket earning the consumer one Everyday Rewards point.
The orange Everyday Rewards card replaces the Countdown Onecard that launched 20 years ago.
Every 2000 points earns the shopper a $15 voucher which can be spent at Woolworths or BP.
But the opening week meant bigger rewards and savings, Mark Wolfenden of Woolworths New Zealand said.
“Instead of spending $1000 on groceries to get the equivalent points, new members this month will be gifted the points straight off the bat to help them get money off their shop faster,” Wolfenden said.
Registered members of Onecard will see their existing points and vouchers automatically transferred to their Everyday Rewards accounts.
Instead of sending the old plastic Onecards to the landfill Woolworths has collection boxes at all in-store customer service desks and will recycle them with TerraCycle.
Once collected, the cards will be sorted, cleaned, and melted into plastic pellets and remoulded to make new recycled products such as outdoor furniture and plastic shipping pallets.
The launch of Everyday Rewards is a step closer to Countdown's rebrand to Woolworths.
Woolworths had partnered with BP, online alcohol store Vineonline and ASB and said there would be more partners announced soon.
“Members can earn up to 4000 points – the equivalent of $30 of rewards vouchers – simply by downloading and signing into the Everyday Rewards app and linking to their ASB Visa Rewards credit card, BPme and Vineonline,” Wolfenden said.
Customers could get double points on all shops for the next three days and a 20 cent per litre discount at BP (on a fill of up to 50L) with the first scan of the Everyday Rewards card.
Savvy shopper Emma Healy said she shopped around between supermarkets but was also a fan of loyalty schemes and said Woolworths’ new card “offered money for nothing”.
“There are double points and 1000 points for downloading the app which is halfway to a voucher for doing nothing.”
The Christchurch woman who runs money-saving website Mum’sMoney New Zealand had estimated she would earn around $50 this month with the launch of Everyday Rewards.
“It would be silly not to sign up and get them even if you are not a regular customer.”
But Consumer NZ urged shoppers to do their homework before signing up to any rewards scheme and said there were often more savings to be had from shopping around than staying loyal.
Gemma Rasmussen from Consumer NZ said the advocacy group was “not a fan” of loyalty schemes and said supermarkets earned “big money from the data they collect from us”.
“That’s your personal information and a data trail of your habits,” Rasmussen said.
“Often, the information collected is used by a business to refine their products and services and sometimes to target their advertising.”
She said some businesses shared information with third parties - although New World and Woolworths assure customers they do not.
“We think the ‘data downside’ outweighs the benefits for consumers,” Rasmussen said.
The current cost-of-living crisis meant shoppers were even more likely to be swayed by discounts for food and petrol, she said.
But shopping around was usually cheaper than the rewards earned for staying loyal.
Consumer NZ recently assessed prices for 48 products with a Onecard or New World Clubcard discount, and which were also available at Pak’nSave and The Warehouse, neither of which use a loyalty discount scheme.
“Three-quarters of the loyalty discounted products we looked at were available at an equal or lower price by shopping elsewhere,” Rasmussen said.
In October 2023 Consumer NZ analysed the price of nearly 50 products that had a Onecard or Clubcard discount that were also available at Pak’nSave and The Warehouse.
It found three-quarters of the loyalty discounted products were available at an equal or lower price by shopping elsewhere.
Kirsty Wynn is an Auckland-based journalist with more than 20 years experience in New Zealand newsrooms. She has covered everything from crime and social issues to the property market and has a current focus on consumer affairs.
