LOYALTY PROGRAMS IN AUSTRALIA: THE AFFAIR CONTINUES

The Australian market offers an abundance of loyalty programs that offer consumer rewards. There are different loyalty programs offered by individual businesses such as ESPRIT, David Jones and groups of businesses such as Fly Buys and oneworld. Previous research (Stegemann, 2002) suggested with regard to Australian loyalty programs that businesses enter a particular loyalty program for the following reasons: (1) …increase and improve customer databases, (2) enhance participating companies ’ image/reputation, (3) provide cost efficiencies, (4) counteract the threat of out of town shopping destinations such as stand alone superstores, retail parks and factory outlet centers, (5) aim at a positive search for community alliances such as by bringing retailers together, (6) add value to their customers with respect to their needs for other goods and services, (7) with a higher number of participating retailers customers can collect points quicker and redeem their points for rewards This paper builds on the findings of this research study and expands on it by examining the nature of sampled Australian loyalty programs with respect to specified research questions; addressing further questions such as are there any advantages in being part of several loyalty programs by comparing costs vs. outcome; and investigating the nature and extent of overlaps within loyalty programs.