Custom label specialist Guru Labels has launched a unique loyalty program that offers thousands of dollars in permanent discounts to loyal trade customers.
"We've been working on a loyalty program for trade for the past 3-6 months because we wanted to find a way to reward the people who've stayed with us," said Guru owner Nick Lowe. "We racked our brains before deciding to go down this path because we couldn't find anything like it operating anywhere else in the industry, but we were determined to provide our customers with a little incentive and we wanted to keep it simple."
The loyalty program, which begins on July 1, offers three levels of discounts: gold, silver and bronze.
A Gold Guru customer - someone who spends a total of $50,000 in the financial year to 30 June, 2017 - will automatically receive a permanent 10% discount on every subsequent order. A Silver Guru - for those who spend $25,000 in a year - will deliver a 7.5% discount on all future orders, and customers who spend $10,000 in a year will qualify for a permanent Bronze Guru discount of 5%.
"It comes down to total dollars spent in a year, and in the print space a 5%-10% discount is good dollars," said Lowe.
The company, based at Tuggerah on the NSW Central Coast, has enjoyed a surge in business since last year completing a digital transformation with the installation of a Xeikon 3030 digital press backed up by the first GM (Grafisk Maskinfabrik) laser die cutting system in the country.
"We had about 50 trade customers with the old equipment and it was a struggle to stay competitive but the new Xeikon and the laser cutter are working beautifully and we're up to about 500 customers right now for labels," said Lowe. "So it's been something of a growth spurt over the past 15 months that has exceeded what we thought we could have done and we've had to add some extra staff. The GM laser cutter (see video below) is the real money maker and it's a wonderful piece of equipment because it allows us to complete multiple cutting jobs in one print run. I think we'll see more of those here in Australia in the coming years and I'll be very surprised if more people don't jump on the laser bandwagon."
Guru Labels is also cutting down its lead time from seven working days to five days and is about the send out it its second batch of Label Tool Boxes - a kit with a book of sample label stocks and finishes.