Superdrug marketing, ecommerce and customer director Matt Walburn speaks to Retail Week on spearheading changes in the loyalty scheme market and the journey since the launch of Superdrug Marketplace.
Walburn started at Superdrug’s parent company, AS Watson Group, around the same time its Health and Beauty card was launched. More than a decade since then, the retailer’s loyalty scheme has evolved in a big way, most recently with the launch of its app-based VIP rewards scheme.
This month also marks a year since the high-street giant launched its own marketplace platform – despite its biggest competitor Boots having shelved the launch of its marketplace indefinitely earlier this year.
Walburn speaks to Retail Week about innovating the world of loyalty schemes, upscaling through Superdrug Marketplace and his predictions for the festive season.
Talk to us about the new VIP rewards scheme.
“It’s the latest in a series of innovations on our loyalty proposition. We’ve always been very proud of what our loyalty scheme offers and how we attach online to it. But we really felt it was time to bring in changes and offer some innovation.
“Around about a year ago, we started to get into member pricing in a big way. Going into 2024, more and more of our promotions are ringfenced for our health and beauty card customers, which we know our members are really enjoying and is reflected in our numbers.
“But we didn’t want us to stay there. We wanted to say: okay, the market’s moved its member pricing piece, what can we offer on top of that to innovate? And that’s where the VIP loyalty scheme comes in.
“It sounds like a relatively exclusive feature, but I would say it’s exclusive only in name. All the great things that come with that, in terms of discounts, is a win-win for customers. It is very much a maximised kind of democratic affair, where we’re trying to get as many people into VIP status as possible. And do that in a gamified way through our app.”
How do you see these reward updates playing out in the future?
“We have upwards of 17 million members on our health and beauty card scheme and the majority of them have the physical card. Around 20% of members have the app, but we want to flip that around the other way.
“We’re going to use this VIP scheme, which is app-based only, to give customers and stores an incentive to get people to transfer across to the app.
“All the things that come with an app-based scheme, in terms of push notification and the ability to talk more directly to our members, will help steer members and show them the things they might not be aware of, such as our health services and beauty services.”
How has Superdrug Marketplace fared one year on from its launch?
“We’re really proud of our marketplace and getting that live in a relatively quick period of time because we saw the opportunity and we wanted to go for it.
“One thing that a marketplace allows you to do is increase your range rapidly, without getting bogged down in the necessary infrastructure that is needed to do so.
“So for us, we knew that particularly online, bringing on a marketplace would rapidly extend our range into new categories, plus new products that we haven’t had access to before. We’ve delivered on that.
“We’ve doubled our range since the launch a year ago, which is an amazing feat. We’ve added 16,000 extra skews to our online range. And we’re pleased with the progress so far in terms of sales.
“We had our record week last week and have done over 120,000 marketplace orders this year.”
What are your predictions for the festive season?
“We’ve certainly seen Christmas come early this year, that’s for sure. We can see consumers being as savvy as ever and they’re looking for early deals. We suspect that Black Friday will be Christmas-driven more than it ever has been.
“You can see that in the way that we’re merchandising the Black Friday event in-store and online. There is definitely this link between Black Friday shopping and Christmas purchases.
“I think it’s going to be as competitive as ever. Consumers are watching their budgeting accordingly. But we do still believe that customers will spend on the right kind of deal. We are confident in a buoyant Christmas this year.”
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