ARLINGTON, Texas & ATLANTA -- The Pinnacle Corp., a leading supplier of automation technology to the convenience store and petroleum industries, and Sionic Mobile, with its ION mobile commerce platform, will integrate their solutions to launch a mobile loyalty and payments platform for fuel retailers.
The combined solution is among the first in the industry to leverage Bluetooth beacons inside the store and at pump islands to facilitate cloud-based payments and instant rewards for smartphone consumers.
The Pinnacle-ION solution helps convenience stores eliminate high-cost credit-card fees on fuel purchases and encourages repeat business by providing customers instant rewards based on in-store checkout amounts. Using Bluetooth beacons for pump authorizations, customers can quickly and easily pay for fuel with a few taps on their phones. Leveraging fully encrypted and tokenized mobile payments, the process is more secure than traditional card swipe methods, the companies said, protecting both the user and fuel retailer against fraudulent activity.
The beacons also deliver relevant promotions to customers, boosting in-store traffic and driving high-margin sales.
"Our priority is to deliver modern tools that automate the broad spectrum of c-store operations," said Drew Mize, Pinnacle's COO. "We continue to evolve our approach to ensure our services and products meet the current demands of fuel retailers and their consumers. We are pleased to partner with Sionic Mobile to integrate Pinnacle's Palm POS platform with their next-generation loyalty program that combines mobile payments and instant rewards in one application, making it easy for operators to deliver an exceptional customer experience, while reducing costly transaction fees."
Consumers download the ION Rewards app (available in the App Store and Google Play store), create an account and then use their smartphones to pay for fuel at the pump. Users receive an instant, 10-cents-per-gallon savings on every fuel purchase at any ION-enabled fuel retailer. ION Rewards users also earn 1% to 3% in rewards on every in-store, non-fuel purchase.
"We are proud to partner with Pinnacle to help convenience stores better connect with nearby consumers, while reducing operating costs," said Ronald Herman, CEO of Sionic Mobile. "We understand the increasing fees associated with credit and debit transactions, along with decreasing in-store sales are two of the biggest challenges facing c-store operators. ION is the only loyalty application that completely eliminates credit card fees on fuel purchases and rewards customers instantly based upon checkout amounts and payment types."
Atlanta-based Sionic Mobile markets to smartphone consumers and rewards them for every mobile checkout. The mCommerce company uses mobile devices and the cloud to connect merchants with nearby, ready-to-spend consumers. The company is the maker and provider of ION--fully digital mobile promotions, gift cards, payments and rewards apps for phones and tablets. Merchants use ION Loyalty to increase traffic, sales and margins, reduce credit-card fees and get good customers back more often. Consumers use ION Rewards to earn IONs at every checkout, including sending gift cards or IONs to others, then spend them like cash on anything at any time at more than 30,000 retail locations nationwide. The free apps support iOS and most Android devices.
Arlington, Texas-based Pinnacle is a leader in the automation technology industry focusing on the convenience store and petroleum industries. Pinnacle delivers products that automate the broad spectrum of convenience store operations and supply-chain management of fuel operations. Nationwide, Pinnacle's products and services are used daily in thousands of convenience store outlets to automate and improve their store operations and by fuel marketers to increase their efficiency in the complex management of fuel delivery.
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