The Prepaid Press - Giftango Expands Digital Gift Card Operations to Europe

06/19/2013

Giftango Expands Digital Gift Card Operations to Europe

Opens European Headquarters in Ireland; Signs New Merchants

PORTLAND, OR (June 11, 2012) Giftango Corporation, provider of digital gift card fulfillment, rewards, incentives and promotions technology, has launched its European subsidiary, Giftango International, with the opening of its Dublin office. UK based loyalty program manager Countdown and rewards and incentives provider Ovation Incentives are the first to launch Giftango powered digital gift card solutions in the market, featuring eight UK merchants.

The Global Prepaid Exchange estimates the Euro Zone gift card and voucher market for gifting and corporate incentives to be approximately €21.8 billion with the UK representing approximately 25% of the total market (€4.59 billion). Although eGifting is still a small percentage of the total European gift card and voucher market (<1%), eGift offerings with brick and mortar merchants is growing.

Giftango says its initial clients are focused on digitizing fulfillment of gift card and voucher programs in the B2B segment. According to the UK Gift Card & Voucher Association (UKGCVA), voucher sales to corporate clients in 2011 represented an estimated 52% of total voucher and gift card sales in the UK, an estimated 20 percentage points higher than the US share of corporate sales.

"We spent much of 2011 having conversations with leading European merchants and the corporate programs that buy gift cards from them," said Marcell King, vice president of Merchant and International Development for Giftango. "We learned a few things taking this thoughtful approach. The UK B2B gift card market is poised to yield a very high return for those corporations and merchants launching digital gift cards. The opportunities for digital gifting developing in both the mobile and social markets cannot be denied. Today we're introducing a corporate eGift product that fits the UK market."

UK based Countdown says it manages loyalty programs for more than a hundred companies in the UK and currently makes available plastic gift cards and paper vouchers to more than 1.5 million recipients. UK based Ovation Incentives is a technology and marketing company that designs, develops and manages global incentive, reward and motivation solutions for its clients. Giftango will enable consumers participating in Countdown and Ovation managed programs to receive digital gift cards/vouchers from participating merchants almost instantly instead of waiting for physical gift cards and vouchers by post.

"We love that our program participants will now be able to receive their vouchers by email or SMS to their PC's and smartphones," says Kevin Lake, CEO of Countdown. "Importantly, this development will enable us to work with our partners to deliver new, dynamic and exciting offers to our members. Merchant partners will benefit from promotion opportunities targeted closely to their audiences."

Initial merchants participating in Giftango's digital gift card and voucher B2B Channel Program will include merchants such as Marriott, Hotel Voucher Shop, Theatre Tokens, Travelocity Gift Cards and SpaFinder.

Source: Giftango Corporation; Countdown; Ovation Incentives