Downtown Charlottetown launches loyalty program

Shoppers in downtown Charlottetown will soon be able to take advantage of a new loyalty program.

The program is called Brownie Points, and is designed by a St. John’s, N.L. company. P.E.I. is the fifth province to use the program, which is specifically designed for small, independent, local stores.

Jennifer Ridgway owns Luna and Moonsnail, two of the five Charlottetown shops paying $49 a month to be part of the program.

Ridgway likes that Brownie Points allows her to establish her own reward system.

"You can set whatever you like,” said Ridgway.

“Do a discount, or a free gift, or people would come in after a certain number of points have like a half-price party or something.”

The program is available to customers either through use of a keychain card or smartphone app.

Brownie Points CEO Matthew Stenback told CBC News another advantage of the program is points are applied to individual stores, not pooled together. Points can only be redeemed at the store where they were collected, so client stores know they are rewarding their customers.

"Someone who's never been to your store before could potentially have a bunch of points and come in and redeem them,” said Stenbeck about other loyalty programs.

“They're getting your VIP reward for not really ever really being at your store.”

Downtown Charlottetown Inc is holding an information session at the end of this month for other businesses that may be interested in signing on to the program.

For mobile device users: Will a loyalty program encourage you to shop in downtown Charlottetown?