Gift Card Facts for the 2018 Holidays

The National Retail Federation reported that gift cards have been the #1 requested gift card for more than 10 years.  This year, according to the research, gift cards are still the #1 item and clothing the #2 

• A gift card study by InComm, who drew responses from almost 2500 US consumers, found the following interesting data about shopper behavior for the 2018 holiday season ahead:
• Consumers plan to purchase on average seven gift cards for their immediate families.  That fact alone suggests the gift cards are not an impersonal gift.
• Respondents also plan to purchase two gift cards for friends and neighbors, two for teachers and coaches and one for a co-worker.
• Where there is a strong relationship between the giver and the recipient 86% of respondents indicated that the when they receive a specific gift card, it is for brand that they like
• Pairing a gift card with another item for the recipient is an increasing trend among holiday shoppers that is leading to incremental sales for retailers. 66% of respondents indicated they will give their gift cards in personalized greeting cards or combined with another item.  12% said they would give a card with a homemade item.

People Want the Holiday Experience

Brick-and-mortar stores will be the primary location where consumers plan to do their holiday shopping. 50% expect to do nearly all of their holiday shopping in-store,  an additional 35.1% plan to do a moderate amount in store and only 1.3% will not do any in-store holiday shopping.  

When asked what they liked about shopping in person, 40% s said that the activity gets them in the holiday mood, and  21% indicated they enjoyed the  festive decorations, displays and sounds of the season found in stores.

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Electronic (or Mobile) vs Physical Gift Cards

The gift card industry finds that demand just keeps growing. The National Retail Federation has reported that gift cards are the No. 1 requested gift during the holiday season for more than 10 years, and it doesn’t look like it will be any different in 2018.

While the incentive industry has seen continuing growth and interest in electronic and mobile gift cards, new research indicates that planners should not count out physical gift cards for their awards programs.  New Findings from National Gift Card show that three out of four incentive recipients still redeem their loyalty points for physical gift cards. 

NGC has thousands of corporate clients that connect to their inventory of more than 500 physical and digital brands.  According to their B2B Gift Card Report:

75 percent of the volume in gift card program redemptions is still in physical cards, while just 25 percent is for digital gift cards.

Of the total gift cards used, closed loop cards (retail branded) had 26.8% of the total volume of gift card programs, while closed loop cards (banks, Visa. MasterCard etc.) were are 21.8%. 

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net

Does You Company Give Turkeys Away for the Holidays

How many companies give turkeys to their workers each year over the holidays? While estimates are hard to attain, some studies show that it’s probably a little less than 3%.  

According to a survey few years ago of 210 businesses by the Bureau of National Affairs, the figure has bounced around, tumbling from about 5 or 6 percent each year between 2000 and 2004 to only 2 percent in 2005 and 3 percent in 2006. 

Americans associate turkeys with the feast that Pilgrims and Indians shared after a bountiful harvest in Colonial days. And some historians speculate that passing out turkeys to workers during the holidays began in 19th-century England with bosses who had read about, and did not want to be compared with, Ebenezer Scrooge (who, after all, eventually bought one for Bob Cratchit).

But times have changed.  Stats today show that over 4 times more companies give away gift certificates for the holidays rather than the actual turkeys.  The employees use them to redeem for almost anything at the supermarket.  Others give away the kind of super gift certificates that can be redeemed for either grocery stores, or many other brand named retailers.  So many things have changed in the American workforce that giving employees a choice of what they want is a far more popular option. 

Why do companies use holiday gifts for employees? 

It’s good business

Employee recognition is a key piece of employee engagement and a holiday gift shows you care and are grateful for employees’ hard work and dedication to the success of your business.

It’s an opportunity for managers to engage with employees

Sharing the gift, personally, with a big smile, warm handshake and hearty “Thank You” is a priceless opportunity for managers to make employees feel valued and appreciated.

It’s about family

These gifts are often shared with families and add joy to their holiday season. Holiday gifts embody the grateful spirit of the season, and that includes your company’s gratitude.

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net

Employee Engagement - If It Is Right – It Is Right

The following excerpt was shamelessly stolen from a Blog entitled “What is Paul Thinking?’,

The blog is written by Paul Hebert, a friend and one I truly admire for his knowledge of how to employe incentives and recognition to motivate employee performance.  He also has a knack for telling it like it is and hitting the nail on the head about subjects such as this. He tells folks what they should hear but rarely do, as experts in those fields would rather tiptoe around the subjects for fear of losing potential sales. 

The article was posted 5-4-17 and was titled, “New Research: Employees Work Harder When They Are Almost Starving” It should be very meaningful to anyone who is involved with employee engagement and recognition.

“How many posts have you read about proving the ROI of engagement programs? How many articles, posts, tweets talk about how to show senior management the “financial value of engagement.” Too many.

Because, if you’re looking for business rationale to recognize people in your organization, you’re doing it wrong.

If you have to sell your senior manager on the ROI of engaging with your employees your CEO sucks. If your leadership team doesn’t have time to recognize and validate the work your employees are doing you now have evidence they only do their job for the money. Period.

For them, engagement and recognition efforts are simply variables in an equation that gets them mo’ money, mo’ money, mo’ money. Again. Period.

Granted – there are limits to what any company can do to support and engage employees. But those limits get a bit blurry when you can’t prove the ROI on better employee support but for some reason the car allowances for all your executives don’t have the same scrutiny applied. What is the ROI on all those perqs you spread like peanut butter across everyone on mahogany row? How can you say THAT is important, but training for managers on how engagement works isn’t?

I know I’m being facetious to prove a point. Of course you need to plan the expense of engagement and recognition. Of course you have to put some boundaries around this. But when you don’t require the same due diligence for executive perqs and other questionable business expenses you are simply being thick. And a bit callous and a bit disconnected. And just a lousy manager.

Don’t be that guy or gal. Be a good manager. Do engagement. Do recognition. Do employee support. Don’t worry about the ROI – worry about ROH – return on humanity.

For more information on Ultimate Choice Inc.’s products or services or other white papers please contact us at Ultimatechoiceinfo@cox.net