Any thoughts on Borders' new "loyalty" program?
Big article in the Wall Street Journal today about Borders cutting back loyalty rewards in its very popular program. See http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117504224198951153.html?mod=hpp_us_at_glance_mm for the story. (I believe non-subscribers can access this WSJ link only for a limited time period.)
It seems to me that there are several things wrong with Borders' new approach. I don't begrudge them the need to contain costs, but the way this new program is configured doesn't sound like it's going to be very attractive at all to customers, and I predict a virtual insurrection of customer dissent from the company's most frequent current customers, who now enjoy 10% discount days when they can buy all they want to at a Borders Bookstore at a 10% discount, and several other benefits.
What does everyone else think of this new program?
I agree, I don't begrudge them for needing to contain costs, but I find it hard to believe that they couldn't have modeled these costs prior to launching the program. In all, the new program is underwhelming from a customer point of view.
As a big buyer of books, I have recently been going out of my way to shop at Borders. However, with these changes,
I think I'll be going back to ordering from Amazon.