From printed vouchers to a digital loyalty platform

Profi Romania Case Study
4
min read

1,000,000

member sign-ups in 8 months

70%

higher basket size for app using members

Simon Kennedy, Chief Digital Officer

Simon Kennedy joined Foodstuffs North Island in April 2019 as Chief Digital Officer, and has a big role in implementing the new partnership between Lobyco and Foodstuffs.

“We want to offer a great experience across all our channels at all times, meeting our customers wherever they are. This is about us earning their trust so we can give back to them in terms of a more relevant, engaging experience. This approach not only benefits our customers but also reinforces our commitment to them—and that is what loyalty is all about.”

Dominic Quin, Group GM, Marketing & Media

Dominic Quin is Foodstuffs NZ Group General Manager leading the national Marketing, Brandin gand Communications department, serving both Foodstuffs North Island and Foodstuffs South Island.

"One of our challenges was that our member-owners didn’t have the ability to connect with their customers through digital channels and engage at key decision-making moments for the customer. Now, with this new platform, our members can connect directly with our customers."

In its plans to create a digital ecosystem that may drive more customers to its stores, the network is happy to have joined efforts with Lobyco and acknowledges the progress made so far.

Pawel Musial

CEO, Profi

The Profi Journey

Profi is one of Romania’s leading grocery retailers and is the country’s no. 1 employer. In one of the fastest developing retail markets in Europe, Profi strives to deliver value for its customers through its distinctive Romanian heritage and a fundamental understanding of local needs and wishes. Profi operates a multi-banner business and rapidly expands its national footprint, with over 1,580 stores already serving one million daily customers.

With swiftly evolving customer needs and adventurous business ambitions, Profi was keen to develop a market-leading digital platform to complement its physical store assets and innovative concepts.

Profi’s digital ambitions

The Solution

Profi brought Lobyco on board in 2021 to develop their strategic loyalty platform ensuring they could tap into strong retail expertise in Lobyco to develop their full loyalty proposition and reap the benefits of an integrated platform to engage and keep their customers coming back. The joint teams built the roadmap to ensure we bring exciting and value-adding services to Romania shoppers, whilst delivering strong business benefits based on building real sales impact for stores.

The app was launched first to its employees in January 2022, followed by a public launch in April 2022.

The Result

The small-scale internal launch in early 2022 went viral as word spread of the new app and the benefits employees and customers could access. By the time the public launch happened in April 2022, member sign-ups were nearing their target for 2022.

8 months post-launch Profi have seen sign-ups x4 of expectations and the app already driving customer engagement through its unique and connected capabilities as customers are receiving special offers and enjoying unique games on the app.

Business results are showing that the basket sizes of members are 11% higher after adopting the app.

We launched the Profi app (#1 in App Store) to get closer to our customers, offering them personal and relevant services and products – anywhere, anytime.
Gabriela Sirbu, Digital Marketing Director at Profi

Customers & staff reactions

Watch Daniel Hodjar, Store Manager of Profi Apex in Timisoara, explain how the new app was received in the stores by staff and customers, and what the gains and challenges have been so far.