More than 75 local merchants in Boston are offering cash rebates to customers and donations to charities. The city-based loyalty program launched last week.
Consumers register at BostonCommunityChange.org for a loyalty card that tracks transaction amounts at point-of-sale.
Called Boston Community Change, the program takes 4% to 6% of a customer’s total sale and splits the funds three ways. Customers receive a cash rebate (which can be redeemed across participating merchants); a portion goes to one of 36,000 schools nationwide chosen by the customer or one of 1.2 million nonprofit groups, and another portion goes to the 19 Boston neighborhood commercial districts participating in the loyalty program.
“This is another innovative idea to help strengthen our neighborhood business districts,” Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino said during the program’s launch last week.
Participating retailers, consumers and benefiting organizations can all track donations at the Web site.
The program was developed as a partnership between Boston Main Streets, an initiative established by the City of Boston, and Seattle-based Interra Project, a non-profit group that promotes commerce.
The idea “helps support and strengthen our neighborhoods,” said DeWayne Lehman, spokesperson, department of neighborhood development, City of Boston. “We’ve had our shopping-on-main-street promotion, dining-on-main-street promotion and holiday-on-main-street promotion and we’ve found that this loyalty program gives us the ability to tie these three pieces together under one larger umbrella.”
Additional vendors will be added to the program as it develops, Lehman said. Merchants fit one of six categories: business and professional services; education; food, drink and entertainment; health, fitness and beauty; home and auto; and retail.
Santa Rosa, CA-based Nietech Corp. handles the program. The company manages a similar initiative for the city of Santa Rosa.
The program is supported by local p.r. initiatives and articles in local newspapers such as The Boston Globe and Boston Business Journal.
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