Tesco’s Clubcard has been crowned the best supermarket loyalty programme in the UK by shoppers looking for the best deals amid the cost of living crisis.
The supermarket’s loyalty scheme, Clubcard Prices, was deemed to offer the best discounts and rewards of all the major supermarkets, according to a new ranking by Moneyboat.co.uk.
The research ranked retailers on a multitude of categories such as joining fees, exclusive discounts, free delivery, personalised offers and coupons provided.
Tesco took the top spot with 99 points out of 100, after ticking all the boxes but ‘personalised offers’ and ‘free delivery’.
Clubcard’s strong exclusive discounts and points scheme, in addition to perks such as savings on petrol, transport and entertainment partnership discounts, and the ability to use it for charity donations, helped make it top of the league table.
It also won on customer satisfaction, with a score of 3.82 out of 5.
Tesco loyalty director, Tash Whitmey, said: “We’re helping millions of customers spend less through Tesco Clubcard, with Clubcard Prices offering up to 50% off thousands of products.
“Our customers can also use their points to bring down the cost of their shopping, or towards the cost of fuel.”
Sainsbury’s Nectar card programme came second with an overall score of 88 out of 100. The UK’s second-biggest grocer fared well across most of the criteria – in addition to offering similar discounts and perks as Clubcard, the Nectar scheme is also heavily focused on personalised rewards.
However, Sainsbury’s loyalty programme is still hit or miss with shoppers on the customer satisfaction front (see table above). Its customer satisfaction score was only 2.58 out 5 as nearly 40% of survey respondents said they were “somewhat satisfied” with the scheme.
This could be due to the complexity of the digital scheme – customers who wish to enjoy the full advantages of Nectar’s personalised rewards often need to use a combination of its Smart Shop and Nectar apps during their shops.
The Co-op’s Membership scheme ranked third by offering multiple perks including the best pound to credit ratio, or the percentage of money translated into buying power.
The rest of the major UK grocers in the league table – Asda, Lidl, M&S, Iceland, Waitrose and Morrisons – all scored much more poorly than the podium winners.
Asda’s new Rewards scheme snagged fourth place, despite having only hit stores this August, with one of the highest customer satisfaction scores.
Morrisons and Waitrose took the bottom spot after failing to offer many of the perks their rivals did.
However, both supermarkets have been making efforts lately to improve their loyalty scheme as inflation bites into people’s budgets.
Waitrose, which has recently brought back its free hot drink offer for MyWaitrose cardholders as part of a larger partnership with Caffe Nero, said the study “failed to take into account” how important some of the benefits and rewards it offers are to its loyal customer base - including offers at the in-store counters, money off dry cleaning and cashback on ‘Healthy Living’ products for customers with Vitality Health insurance.
A spokesman for the supermarket said: ”myWaitrose provides personalised offers and instant savings. Independent and industry-recognised studies routinely find it to be very popular amongst customers.
“This study fails to take into account a range of factors - including other benefits like daily free coffees and monthly magazines for our members.
”Similarly, our partnership with Caffe Nero which provides rewards in their branches too, has been overlooked in their methodology.”
Meanwhile, The Grocer reported last week that Morrisons introduced Clubcard-style promotions on an array of lines as part of its My Morrisons perks.
A Morrisons spokeswoman said: “My Morrisons is purposefully built upon instant rewards rather than long-term point building. The rewards give customers discounts on the categories that customers say matter most to them including meat, dairy and impulse.
“We continue to listen to our customers and recently introduced My Morrisons Exclusives as well as our Christmas Collector scheme.
“In addition, our Basket Bonus feature has received a festive makeover so when a customer scans the app or swipes their card they will now be in with a chance to ‘bag a bonus’ offer such as some Morrisons mince pies, a festive coffee or money off a shop.”
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