One BonusA loyalty program for a cafe
Updated 31 August 2026
A coffee shop is the textbook case for a stamp card: visited most days, one product at one price, and a queue too short for anybody to do arithmetic. Buy nine, get the tenth — and nothing else.
Why points do not work on a coffee
A coffee is a few hundred dram. Five percent of that is a rounding error, and a balance that grows by a rounding error is a balance nobody looks at. Six months in, the customer has enough for a third of a cup.
A stamp moves the whole way every visit. Seven of ten is a fact somebody carries around in their head, and it is the reason they walk past the other café on the corner.
The numbers
Eight to ten stamps. A card of ten is a ten percent discount paid only to somebody who came ten times — cheaper than any across-the-board discount and far more effective at producing the tenth visit.
Give the free cup at the size the customer normally buys, not the smallest one. A free small when they always order a large reads as a trick, and it is the fastest way to make a good program feel mean.
Speed at the counter
The whole interaction has to fit inside the time the machine is running. Scanning the customer’s code takes about as long as putting a lid on, which is the only budget available at eight in the morning.
On One Bonus the stamp is recorded against the person, so there is no card to find, nothing to lose, and the customer can see how close they are without asking.
Common questions
How many stamps should a coffee loyalty card have?
Eight to ten. Ten is effectively a ten percent discount paid only to customers who visited ten times. Fewer than eight gives away too much per visit; more than ten and people stop believing they will finish it.
Should a cafe give points or stamps?
Stamps. On a basket of a few hundred dram a points balance grows too slowly to be noticed, while a stamp card visibly advances on every single visit.
Can a cafe run a stamp card without paper cards?
Yes. On One Bonus the stamp is recorded against the customer’s account, so there is nothing to print, nothing to lose and nothing to forge — and you can see how many cards are part-finished at any time.
Put your stamp card in the phone
Read next
- By industryA cafe, a pharmacy and a car wash need different programs. Visit frequency, basket size and margin decide the mechanic — pick your trade and see the fit.
- RestaurantA restaurant is visited rarely with a large bill, so points and levels fit better than stamps. Where to set tier thresholds and how to reward a booking, not just a bill.
- BakeryBread is bought on the way home, every day, in cash. A stamp card on a phone survives what a paper card does not, and it tells you which hour of the day sells.
- Bar and pubA bar lives on regulars and on quiet weeknights. Reward the visit rather than the spend, and use coupons to move the nights that need moving.
- Grocery storeA grocery basket is frequent and varied, which is exactly what a points rate is for. How to set the percentage, and why the checkout queue decides the design.
- ShopA small shop cannot ask people to install an app for it alone. Joining a network means the card is already in the pocket before the first purchase.
- Clothing storeFashion sells in bursts and goes quiet between them. Levels hold the gap, and a coupon timed to a new arrival beats a permanent discount that trains people to wait.
- Beauty salonA salon knows exactly when a client is due back. Reward the return within the window, and see which master keeps clients and which loses them.