National Petroleum News (NPN) has been the independent voice of the petroleum industry since 1909 as the opposition to Rockefeller’s Standard Oil. So, motor fuels marketing and retail is not just a sideline for us, it’s our core competency.
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PROFIT CENTERS BY KEITHREID A provider profile on prepaid solutions provider, Blackhawk Network PREPAID PRODUCTS IN CONVENIENCE of Safeway. The company moved from gift cards in grocery to other types of cards—prepaid telecom, prepaid reloadable debit— that still bring prepaid to the mass-market, but in a much broader way. The company now represents products from such companies as Best Buy and Home Depot as well as its own reloadable prepaid debit cards and open Visa gift cards and similar products. During that same time the growth of such products, both in the United States and overseas has been significant. NPN interviewed Teri Llach, CMO of Blackhawk Network to discuss the prepaid market in convenience and the Blackhawk Network approach to business. F NPN: Where is Blackhawk at as a company today? Llach: We have a great mix of reloadable products and we've expanded to the point where we're in over 90 percent of the groceries in the U.S. and we're also in mass-market convenience stores, some drug- stores. We're really excited about the growth in the third-party arena. We usually use (payment research provider) Mercator as a good benchmark in the gift card market. They say that gift cards themselves were growing at about 6 percent, but now they're growing at about 12 percent. We're growing at about three times that, which shows that people are really looking onto the convenience of buying these prepaid prod- ucts at third-party locations. NPN: You got your start in grocery – how are you approaching the convenience sector? Llach: We started in grocery so we were a little late to the party in convenience, but we are really excit- ed about some of the new products that we have in 22 OCTOBER 2011 OR ABOUT THE PAST 10 YEARS PLEASANTON, Calif.-based Blackhawk Network has been a provider of prepaid cards with its beginnings in grocery. That ties into the company's background as a subsidiary the convenience market and some of our exclusive gift card content. We have a lot in digital content and gaming, which can be very exciting in the con- venience market, along with some of the prepaid telecom products and some of the reloadable debit products, which I know 7-Eleven and some of the other players have done a very exciting job with. The consumer at the convenience store is dif- ferent than the consumer at the grocery store, so we really developed a whole internal team focused exclusively on convenience stores, developing products and promotions. Our convenience store task force is really going all out, and they want to treat this market uniquely. Convenience stores are destinations for busy families—it's not just that you're in your car and you want a Snickers bar. With that new audience comes, I think, a responsibility to give them things like a convenient place to reload their debit cards or top up the phone or to choose from a selection of gift cards and in some cases you get gas discount with the purchase. With the fuel stations at Giant Eagle, if you spend $50 on gift cards you get $.50 off on the gas. That's a great deal. NPN: What would be your company perspective on serving the convenience industry? Llach: One of the things that sets Blackhawk apart is the marketing. We don't just hang it on a peg and walk away. We know that it's not "you build it and they will come." Sure building a nice rack and good signage and having the right products are very essential, and we have a great team that will focus on that and convenience. But we also know that communication to the consumer through advertis- ing and promotions are other ways to really give value to the consumer and increase awareness of these types of products. It wasn't so long ago, two to three years ago, that people really didn't under- stand what a prepaid debit card was. Now you have NPN Magazine n www.npnweb.com