Glossary
What is a punch card?
A punch card is a paper loyalty card marked by hand on each qualifying visit, traditionally with a hole punch or a rubber stamp. It is the oldest and still the most common loyalty mechanic in hospitality. Its strengths are cost and simplicity; its weaknesses are loss, forgery and invisibility.
Also called: Paper punch card, Stamp card, Coffee card.
Worth taking seriously rather than dismissing. Punch cards have run loyalty programmes for decades and they do several things well.
What they do well
They cost almost nothing to start, need no setup, work with no power or network, and ask nothing of the customer beyond keeping a card.
Where they fall down
They get lost, which quietly ends a customer’s relationship with the programme. They are trivially forged. And they generate no data at all, so an owner cannot tell how many are circulating, how many are completed, or whether the threshold is right.
The honest comparison
If your only goal is to thank regulars and you have no interest in measuring anything, paper does that job. The case for changing gets strong once you start asking questions paper cannot answer.