It is impossible for the customer not to notice the advertisement: “10% discount on your next purchase”. With this promise, or a similar one, large supermarket chains in Germany such as Lidl, Rewe and Penny are trying to connect more and more consumers to Apps of their own inspiration and to new cashback programs that reward the “loyal » customers.

“More and more offers are aimed exclusively at customers who are willing to download supermarket apps and provide their details,” explains economics professor Carsten Kortum. “As for the rest, they were unlucky.” It’s essentially a give and take, as “loyal” customers enjoy other added benefits. They may have access to a wider variety of products or secure an additional discount. For example, discount supermarket chain Lidl is offering its own ‘Dubai Chocolate’, a confection that’s becoming fashionable these days, with Lidl App users paying a price 45% lower than everyone else.

Are the good old “deals” being lost?

In this way, retail chains gather a wealth of data, which helps them analyze customer preferences and ultimately influence their consumer behavior more effectively. Already today four out of five consumers use a bonus or cashback program.

After all, the idea is not new. One of the first reward programs was presented by IKEA in 1984, under the name “Family Card”. Today, only the discount supermarket chain Aldi does not have a rewards program. One of the reasons for the spread of these programs is that in recent years food prices have been constantly increasing, as a result of which the consumer “chases” with greater zeal the offers and the competition between supermarkets intensifies.

It is even predicted to intensify even more in 2025, when the Rewe chain will launch its own bonus program, via App. As reported by the German News Agency (dpa), the program offers “handy” discounts – from a few minutes to one euro – on specific products, which will change from time to time. Anyone who makes purchases of more than 400 euros in one month will receive an additional 10% discount for the next month’s purchases.

To make this program work, Rewe will pay Payback (the largest German bonus program with 30 million subscribers) the respectable amount of 150 million. euros per year. Large chains, such as Aral petrol stations and Thalia bookstores, currently participate in Payback, from the beginning of 2025 Edeka and Netto supermarkets will participate, while later branches of the Galeria chain will also join.

Few consumers remain “loyal”

However, most people probably don’t feel the need to stay “loyal” to a supermarket chain. According to research by the NIQ company, the trend of shopp-hopping is increasing, i.e. more and more people make a few purchases during the week in many different chains, instead of getting everything they need once a week in a specific supermarket.

That’s not to say that a refund program doesn’t make sense. According to a related survey, 56% of consumers have singled out a specific chain in which they shop most often, while many have even downloaded four or five different Apps to their mobile phones that they use occasionally, when they deem it necessary.

However, Sven Reuter, head of the Smhaggle portal, which compares prices and acts as a market observatory, believes that reward programs do not have a huge benefit for the consumer, as the “return” as a rule does not exceed 1% of the money already on hand spend on his purchases. “Anyone who makes targeted purchases, constantly changing supermarkets and watching all the offers, can save more money and more easily…” points out Reuter.

The role of Artificial Intelligence

In the future, Artificial Intelligence is expected to change a lot in the way rewards programs work. According to a Bitcom survey, 50% of Germans would like the help of Artificial Intelligence to identify the best offers in real time.

As a model, the economist Carsten Kortum cites Spotify, which via App already offers or rather “recommends” to its subscribers an entire playlist, based on the streams they have chosen in the recent past.

Edited by: Yiannis Papadimitriou