Nectar hails success of public sector trial

Nectar has hailed the success of its trial partnership with Birmingham City Council to reward residents with loyalty points as it emerges that a second pilot scheme will launch in Windsor.

Nectar

The Birmingham pilot scheme, which gives residents Nectar points for positive behaviours such as recycling and getting fit, is 40% ahead of all the targets set out by Birmingham city Council in its business case, according to Nectar’s client development director Will Shuckburgh, who heads up the pilot scheme.

It is due to complete next month when Nectar is likely to extend the trial to the rest of Birmingham area. It is currently open to 4,000 residents.

Nectar claims that 25% of eligible households in the pilot scheme have opted to take part and collect Nectar points for visits to leisure centres and for recycling.

Nectar says that at this stage, all the targets on the recycling side of the programme have been exceeded and that people collecting the Nectar points have visited sports centres three times more frequently than people who did not opt in to the scheme.

The partnership with Birmingham City Council is the first time that a public sector organisation has signed up to use the commercial Nectar scheme to encourage behaviour change. At the time, Nectar said that it was open to extending the programme to other areas of the UK.

The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has also begun a six month trial to reward residents that volunteer with Nectar points as well as those that switch to paperless billing and direct debits for council services.

Shuckburgh says: “The principles of how loyalty programmes change behaviour for big brands in the commercial sector is just as applicable in the public sector.

“Where these programmes work best is to provide a nudge towards new behaviours. It’s not just rewarding people for doing something they already do, its about pushing those people that are on the border and encouraging people that might not have done something, to do it.”

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