Kwik Trip’s loyalty program started in 2018 as a “one-to-many” approach, where all customers receive the same email, said David Jackson, director of loyalty and digital marketing at 868-store Kwik Trip.
The La Crosse, Wisconsin-based convenience-store chain evolved to an intermediate “one-to-some” approach and, finally, a “one-to-one” approach, where email marketing is sent on an individual customer basis.
Jackson is a member of CSP's C-StoreTEC board, where he spent the year on the data-driven engagement committee, learning and discussing the topic with other board members. They presented their research and experiences at the C-StoreTEC event in October.
“As we look at the one-to-one approach—and this is where we still have opportunities—[we’re] utilizing some of our partners, and we're looking at [artificial intelligence] and some of the other technologies,” said Jackson at C-StoreTEC. “Can we make this completely personalized to each individual?”
Kwik Trip has between one to two hundred promos going on every month, he said.
In 2025, Kwik Trip aims to have thousands of iterations of an email, Jackson said.
Yesway and Allsup’s measures its customer lifetime value in the context of its rewards program to understand what each customer is worth, said Darrin Samaha, vice president of marketing at Yesway, a 428-store chain based in Fort Worth, Texas and owned by BW Gas & Convenience Holdings LLC. Samaha was also a board member and a speaker at the event.
RaceTrac is also expanding its data-informed marketing with a new app iteration that’s nimbler than before, said Jamie Miller, C-StoreTEC board member and executive director of marketing at RaceTrac, a 580-store chain based in Atlanta.
Kwik Trip is No. 11 on CSP’s 2024 Top 202 ranking of U.S. convenience-store chains by store count. RaceTrac is No. 17. Yesway is No. 19.
“We have done a pretty good job of leveraging the data we have to build audiences and execute them across the different advertising than we do, so that is something we just need to continue to build out,” Miller said.
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