How INCUPLE lost 5,000 loyal customers in one night, and what it did next
A family coffee roastery from Slovakia spent three years building a database of almost 5,000 loyal customers. Then one night its app crashed. Here is how it moved to loyalty cards in Apple and Google Wallet, and what happened in the first weeks.
David Maroši
INCUPLE is a family run specialty coffee roastery from Topoľčany, Slovakia. Five cafés, its own roastery, a barista academy and, since recently, an artisan bakery. Ten years of building a brand that started on an ordinary popcorn machine in a grandmother’s garage.
Over three years it built a database of almost 5,000 loyal customers in its own loyalty app. Then one night the app went down and the data was gone. This is the story of what founder Martin did next, and what happened in the first weeks with Rewardly.
The story was first published by the Slovak magazine Refresher.sk. This version focuses on what it means for any business running a loyalty program. You can read the original article here.
From a popcorn machine to five cafés
When Martin and his partner Katka started in 2015, they were not dreaming of a big business. They roasted coffee on a popcorn machine and learned as they went: roasting, brewing, marketing and running a company. Martin’s mother joined later, and then his father.
“Back then a lot of coffee ended up in the bin. Honestly, the coffees from our early days would not make it to the shelf today,” Martin laughs.
Today INCUPLE is based in Kamanová, between Nitra and Topoľčany, where only a wooden wall with a window separates the café from the roastery. Add five cafés, franchise locations, an online shop, wholesale and the pullt. bakery in Topoľčany.
An off the shelf app: quick success, slow changes
A few years ago INCUPLE decided to launch a digital loyalty app. An external vendor delivered a ready made product, dressed in the brand’s colours. A card, points, stamps. Customers adopted it quickly and the database grew.
“It was quite a success, people liked it. The problem was that every change had to go through their developers and took a very long time. The support was not great,” Martin recalls.
The second problem was less visible but just as serious: almost no analytics. No visit statistics, no data on points, no segmentation. Just numbers without context.
The night 5,000 customers disappeared
Then came the biggest technology crisis in the company’s history. From one day to the next the app collapsed completely, and INCUPLE lost access to a database of almost 5,000 loyal customers.
“One day the app crashed and we could not get to any of the data anymore. It was a small company where everything depended on one owner. So we decided to go a completely different way. We were looking for a partner who is reliable, professional, with good support. And with the appetite to keep improving and growing, just like us,” Martin explains.
They talked to customers immediately. They explained what had happened and promised that nobody would lose the rewards they had earned. Customers stood by them, everything was sorted out within a few weeks, and the search for a new partner began.
Why they chose Rewardly
After that experience Martin had clear criteria: no dependence on a single person, ownership of the data, and analytics that actually answer questions.
- No app to download. The customer scans a QR code and the card lands in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet within 10 seconds.
- The database belongs to the business. Full access and export at any time. Exactly what the old solution was missing.
- Real time analytics. Cards added, visits, stamps, customer segments and push notifications in one dashboard.
- A reliable partner. A team that keeps developing the platform, with support you can count on.
“We chose Rewardly for their well built system, professionalism and the detailed analytics we were missing in the old app,” says Martin.
Results from the first weeks
INCUPLE launched its new loyalty program without an app, and the results were measurable from day one.
- 1,090 loyal customers back in the first two weeks.
- 41 new cards a day in the first weeks after launch.
- 7,000 digital stamps and 3,200 visits since switching to Rewardly.
- 1,400 regular users by the end of June, roughly two months in.
“We can see that a solution where nobody has to download an app is friendlier, faster and more intuitive for customers. In the first two weeks we won back 1,090 of our loyal customers. And we are only getting started,” says Martin.
Asked whether the new program has already shown up in profit, Martin is careful. He cannot evaluate that yet, but he sees more returning customers. And he can reach them regularly with news and offers, which lifts footfall.
What helps him most today are push notifications: one message reaches the whole database. INCUPLE is also preparing a brand new loyalty program for its customers.
How it works in practice
- The customer scans a QR code at the till. The card is saved to Apple or Google Wallet within 10 seconds. No app, no password, no form.
- At every purchase they show the card on screen. Staff add stamps or points straight from the till. The card works offline too.
- The business sees everything in the dashboard. Who comes back, how often, and what they respond to. The database can be exported at any time.
Rewardly connects to the Dotykačka, Storyous, Bookio, Stripe and PapayaPOS point of sale systems. Beyond stamp and points cards it offers gift vouchers, VIP memberships, push notifications and, as the first platform in Slovakia, subscriptions such as a monthly coffee pass.
Launch your loyalty card for free
What to take away from the INCUPLE story
- Your data has to be yours. If you cannot export the database at any time, it is not yours. One outage can wipe it out.
- Every barrier costs you customers. Downloading an app, registering and setting a password put people off. A card in the wallet does not.
- Without analytics you are flying blind. The number of cards is not enough. You need to know who comes back and what works.
- The partner matters more than the feature list. Ask who is behind the product, how fast they handle changes, and what happens when something breaks.
“Digitalisation is essential today for every area of business. I think people are ready for this kind of loyalty system. It also sets a business apart from the competition and raises its value,” Martin adds.
Who is Rewardly
Rewardly is a Slovak startup that gives small and medium sized businesses the same loyalty tool that only large chains used to have. Today it is used by over 200 businesses: cafés, restaurants, gyms, beauty salons and retail. According to the Refresher.sk article, they hold over 650,000 loyalty cards in their customers’ phones.
“It is not just that the customer comes more often. It is also about money that often would not exist at all without a digital system,” says David Maroši, CEO of Rewardly.
With AI onboarding you can launch your own loyalty card in 2 minutes. No coding and no lengthy setup. Enter the basics and the system prepares the program, the card design and the reward mechanics.
Written by
David Maroši