Stamp per visit or stamp per product? How to set the earning rule on your loyalty card
One stamp per visit, or one stamp per coffee? The earning rule decides whether your card drives more visits or bigger orders. Here is how to pick it in five minutes, with the math.
Every stamp card starts with one question that most owners answer in two seconds and then live with for a year: what does a customer have to do to earn a stamp?
There are two honest answers. A stamp for every visit, no matter what they buy. Or a stamp for every product, so three coffees mean three stamps. Both work. Both fail in specific businesses. And the difference shows up in your margin, in how fast the card gets finished, and in what behaviour you actually reward.
Rule one: a stamp for every visit
The customer buys anything, shows the card, gets one stamp. That is the whole rule.
Why it works: it is simple enough to explain in one sentence, staff never have to look at the receipt, and the customer feels progress on every visit. A card that moves every time gets finished. A card that moves every third time gets forgotten.
Where it works best: businesses where a visit is the unit that matters. A barber, a car wash, a nail salon, a lunch spot where almost everyone orders one meal. One visit already means a known amount of revenue, so there is nothing to protect.
Where it hurts: anywhere the ticket swings a lot. If one guest spends €3 on an espresso and another spends €28 on lunch for two, both get the same stamp. The espresso guest can finish a ten stamp card for €30 of revenue and collect a reward that cost you more than you earned from them.
Rule two: a stamp for every product
The customer gets one stamp for each qualifying item. One coffee, one stamp. Three coffees for the table, three stamps. A sandwich, no stamp, because the card is for coffee.
This is the classic café rule, and for good reason. In a café most drinks cost about the same, so one stamp always represents roughly the same revenue, whether it was a cappuccino or a flat white. The reward is usually one of those same drinks, so the cost of the reward stays in a fixed ratio to what the customer paid.
Why it works: it rewards exactly the behaviour you want more of, which is buying more of the product. A customer who brings two friends earns three stamps in one visit and finishes the card three times faster. That feels generous to them and it is profitable for you, because every stamp was paid for. It is also the easiest rule to explain: "every tenth coffee is free" is a sentence everyone already understands.
Where it works best: cafés, bubble tea shops, juice bars, ice cream parlours, bakeries with one hero product, bars with a core drink. Any place where the stamped items sit in a narrow price band and are bought in multiples.
Where it hurts: when the stamped products are not similar in price. If a €2.20 espresso and a €5.50 large iced latte both earn one stamp and the reward is "any drink", the smart customer collects on espressos and redeems on the latte. The fix is simple: narrow the list of items that earn a stamp, or set the reward to "a drink up to €4".
What is one stamp worth?
Most owners pick the rule by instinct. The better way takes two minutes.
Start from the reward. Take its retail value, divide by the number of stamps on the card, and you have the retail cost of one stamp. Then compare it with what a customer pays to earn one.
A café with stamp per product:
- Reward: one free coffee, retail €3.50, your cost about €1.00
- Card length: 10 stamps
- Cost per stamp: €0.10 real cost
- Revenue per stamp: one coffee, about €3.20
The reward costs about 3 percent of the revenue on the card, and it stays that way no matter how fast the customer fills it, because faster only means they bought more coffee.
The same card with stamp per visit in a place where tickets range from €2.50 to €35 is a gamble. The coffee only customer earns the same reward as the table of four. If that describes your business, stamp per product on your core items is the safer rule.
The short version:
- Products in a narrow price band, bought in multiples: stamp per product.
- A visit is the natural unit and the reward is worth less than a typical ticket: stamp per visit.
Want to see the numbers for your own prices? Set the rule and the reward, and the card is live in your customers’ wallets in 2 minutes. No card, no commitment.
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Three settings that matter more than the rule
Card length. Eight to ten stamps works for most local businesses. Fewer than six and the reward comes too often to feel earned. More than twelve and most customers never reach the end.
The first stamp. Give it away at signup. A card with one stamp on it gets finished far more often than an empty one, and it costs you one tenth of a reward.
Clarity in five seconds. "1 coffee = 1 stamp" or "1 visit = 1 stamp" on the card itself is enough. If the rule needs a paragraph, it is too complicated for a till.
Bend the rule with campaigns, not rule changes
The base rule should stay stable for months, because a rule that changes is a rule nobody trusts. Layer short campaigns on top of it instead: double stamps on your slowest weekday announced by a push the evening before, or a bonus stamp for trying a new product in its launch week. These change behaviour on the days you need it without touching the rule your regulars already know.
This is the part paper cannot do. A wallet card can send a push notification straight to the lock screen of everyone who holds it, and 90 percent of them read it.
How this looks in practice
On paper, stamp per product means staff count items while a queue waits, which is why so many paper cards default to per visit even when the math says otherwise. On a digital card it costs nothing. With Rewardly, staff add stamps with one tap, and when the card is connected to your POS the stamps are added automatically from the real purchase, so three coffees mean three stamps. The same card runs double stamp days as a campaign, and the analytics show you which rule actually brings people back. Customers keep it in Apple or Google Wallet, so a finished card is never left at home.
Pick the rule from the math and from your goal. Keep it stable. Use campaigns to shape behaviour. And give away the first stamp.
Ready to try it? Free to start, works in Apple and Google Wallet, and more than 200 businesses already run their loyalty on it.
