Latest / Leaders in Customer Loyalty, Powered by Loyalty360 / #471: Leaders in Customer Loyalty: Brand Stories | Blain’s Farm & Fleet: Cultivating Loyalty Through Customer Insight, Private Brands, and Purpose-Driven Innovation

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#471: Leaders in Customer Loyalty: Brand Stories | Blain’s Farm & Fleet: Cultivating Loyalty Through Customer Insight, Private Brands, and Purpose-Driven Innovation · Leaders in Customer Loyalty, Powered by Loyalty360

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Good afternoon, good morning.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's Mark Johnson from Loyalty360.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to our Leaders in Customer Loyalty series, the Brand Stories edition.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: It's.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Thursday so thank you very much for joining us.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Today, we're spotlighting a brand that is not just keeping up with customer expectations, but actively reshaping them.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Blaine's Farm and Fleet, a trusted name for hardworking families across the Midwest, recently took home top honors at the 2025 Loyalty Expo a platinum award for the co-brand, private label, credit card offerings and a bronze in the offer, incentive and reward design category.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: These wins reflect a loyalty strategy that is grounded and is also forward-thinking, designed to meet the evolving needs of a diverse and growing customer base.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: Joining us today is Allie Blauwit, senior Director of Customer Strategy at Blaine's Farm and Fleet.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Allie is going to unpack the vision behind Blaine's Rewards Program, how the team is leveraging data and empathy to deepen customer relationships, and what it takes to build customer loyalty that lasts in today's competitive retail environment.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Allie, congratulations on the recognition.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the show.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: How?
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: are you today?
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: I'm doing very well, thank you.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Great, great great.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: First off, for those who may not be familiar, can you give us a brief introduction to Blaine's Farm and Fleet?
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: You know how.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Why was the company started?
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely so we are.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: We dubbed ourselves as the modern general store.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: We are a private, family owned company.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: Claude and Burt Blaine pioneered this idea of a discount supply store that was open to the public in order to fulfill their mission of providing quality products to the hardworking and rural farmers of Wisconsin at an affordable price.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: In 1955, you weren't able to give out discounts.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: There weren't any loyalty programs available to the public, you had to have a fleet, and so that would be five engines or more, and Bert and Claude worked together to make this kind of come to life through the partnerships with the government and what the farmers in Wisconsin specifically really needed at that time.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: And really what we've been focused on is providing anything you might need for work, home and outdoor to all of our neighbors across the Midwest.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you mentioned fleet.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: You had to have I guess you said five trucks in order to be able to give some sort of a discount to someone in the 50s.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, five engines, yeah.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: So your truck, your tractor, your lawnmower, any other kind of machinery you might need to run your farm?
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, perfect, and I'm fascinated by different things.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: How did they go about enforcing something like that?
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Did the farmer down the road have to show that they had five different types of equipment or five engines?
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: You had to show some sort of proof for it.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: You know, a lot of it back then was more word of mouth and just making sure and then, once you kind of confirmed, they would get a card.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: So you would actually get basically a loyalty card that would say you know, you're able to get these discounts now because you qualify.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we talked about it before.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: You guys very customer focused.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: You know, in your perspective, in your opinion, what led to the great success.
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean at Blaine's, we really pride ourselves in continuing to adapt and expand our products and services to meet our customers' diverse lifestyles and needs, all while treating you like our neighbor.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: We aim to have everything, like I said, for your home, for work, for outdoor, and how that's been changing over the last several decades.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: You know we're really close to our customers over the last several decades.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: You know we're really close to our customers.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: We get a lot of feedback and insights from our store associates, from our DC team, on what's kind of moving, what's not moving.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Our contact center team and really everyone who works at the corporate office spends quite a bit of time in our stores, on our website, to get a feel for what our neighbors are going through and the decisions they're trying to make every day, and we're making pivots in our business to fulfill that need.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: Okay, and one of the things that we're very interested in, always interested in hearing, because customer loyalty isn't really something that's taught in school, right?
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: We'd love to know more about your role at the company, what you do today and also, how did you get to where you are today?
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Were there roles that you had?
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: Were you an accountant, and said, ah, this loyalty thing sounds really cool.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: How did you go about getting into customer loyalty?
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: I mean I'll tell you first kind of my role here.
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: I oversee customer research, insights and analytics, as well as the personalization strategy and loyalty program management.
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: So my team really plays this crucial role in the whole organization and we serve as the voice of the customer.
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: To get here, though, you know my whole career has been in customer experience.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: You know a customer-centric type of a role from from the very beginning.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: I started in retail with Kohl's.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: I went and spent some time at Harley-Davidson, but all the roles I've always had have been around customer experience, program management, the marketing technology you might need to fulfill customer experience expectations.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: I spent a ton of time in loyalty and credit at Kohl's, really building the execution as well as the strategy and a lot of the analytics behind it to measure success.
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: I kind of got through a lot of those things early in my career and then I spent time in more of a strategy and insights role.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: So I was customer insights, analytics and strategy and I was really focused on the enterprise level, so kind of the large umbrella of what we were trying to do at Kohl's at the time and then also spent some time focused on the women's apparel business and the beauty business, providing insights and analytics and reporting directly to the buying teams, to the merchandising teams digital and in-store to really help bring this experience to life, and they all kind of tie together around.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: I would say, like your long-term customer loyalty, not necessarily a program strategy, but how do you get customers to continue to shop and engage with your brand all the time you know, and whatever that frequency might be, whether they're buying a motorcycle or gear or you know, everyday apparel and home products, like Kohl's had and now here at Blaine's kind of all of those roles are combined under what my team is responsible for.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: So it's been really nice to have, you know, a foot in everything everyone's doing.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: And I say a foot because I'm not necessarily orchestrating you know the day to have you know a foot in everything everyone's doing.
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: And I say a foot because I'm not necessarily orchestrating you know the day to day, but I am definitely guiding and leading the team to help think both long term and short term.
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: How do we maintain that customer loyalty in a company that you know is has been around for 70 years but also has really loyal customers?
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: But that base is changing rapidly as the kind of agricultural space changes, as country living is changing.
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: So there's a lot of opportunity that I'm super excited to oversee.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, a bunch of the city folk want to move out of the country.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: It's kind of a challenge.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: So very iconic brands.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: You work with right Colts back in the day, maybe not as much now but obviously kind of what you did.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: There is very interesting Harley-Davidson iconic brand, deep customer loyalty.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: A quick question just going back to that role how often do people trade up in motorcycles?
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Because I know Harley's had some challenges now with the younger bike offerings.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: I have a motorcycle and just bought it.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: It's like my dream bike.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: I don't ever foresee buying another bike.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: How often?
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: do you change bikes?
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: Not often.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: You know there's certain customers.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: You know the touring customers will get their bike and they would stay on it for years.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: You know they'd get it paid off and they'd spend some time with it without having that payment and then they'd come up with a new feature or something that that model they have doesn't offer anymore.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: So I would say it was probably close to 10 years for those touring bikes.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: For some of the smaller ones, the Sportsters and kind of more, your day-to-day commute bikes, you did see a little bit more of a conversion there but honestly, a lot of what Harley was trying to do was to get you into the brand with the bike and then keep you coming back with the parts, with the accessories, with your gear and your everyday lifestyle apparel as well.
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: So there was definitely an interesting component to what a new customer was for Harley, because it could take a really long time to see someone come back again for that second purchase.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: So it really came back to the accessories.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: OK, absolutely, it's a loyalty program without a loyalty program.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: Exactly yeah.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: There's not many brands that have the extreme loyalists with the tattoos.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: Harley's one.
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: There you go, absolutely.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: So when you look at your role holistically, a lot of responsibility growing and impact.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: Customer loyalty is obviously you guys doing a very solid job with that, from employee engagement all the way through.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: But when you look at some of the challenges or opportunities you face within your role, you know what are some of the biggest challenges or opportunities that you face.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: You know what does keep you up at night.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: That's a great question, you know.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: The main thing for me is we and I say we as in retail, you know we are all trying to attract this new, you know, younger customer to our brands.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: But we have to be really cautious that we're not alienating our existing core customer.
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: Who, who has that loyalty?
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: You know they are coming back frequently, they are spending lots of their wallet with us.
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: They're very important to the brand.
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: But to attract that new customer, sometimes the, the message is going to be really different.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: So the the thing that keeps me up is you know how bold is too bold.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: How do we gain that new customer that's going to kind of give us the largest payoff in, in kind of the investment, in the messaging, the benefits, the experience that's not going to take away our best customers, you know, and who they need us to be?
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: And how do we do all these things while staying authentic and true to ourselves?
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: You know we've got old roots.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: You know we've been around.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: People know us.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: In Wisconsin they refer to us as farm and fleet.
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: In Michigan they refer to us as Blaine's.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: They know who we are and they know what we stand for and they know what they can trust us for and if we make these big changes to attract these new customers who have never heard of us or see farm in our name and think, well, I don't need to shop at a farm store, how do we break through into that awareness and consideration stage without losing who we truly are and still keeping our best customers and our core customers happy?
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: Absolutely.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Blaine's Farm and Fleet operates in a very unique cross-section kind of rural living, the agricultural, but also home maintenance, pet supplies.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: You kind of have a cross-section of great offerings.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: Retail's changing.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: The economic situation is kind of challenging right now as well.
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: How do you see your customers changing and how are you evolving to meet the needs of those customers?
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and it is changing.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: You know we talked a little bit earlier about that kind of big migration to country living over the last five years or so and people are getting a little bit more courageous at things like starting their own gardens vegetables, flowers, even fruits, sometimes raising chickens.
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: You know a lot of people are.
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: They have chickens in the subdivisions.
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: You know they're allowed to have them and so they get them and now they have eggs.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: They're experiencing this small element of what it's like to be in the country and you know to be a farmer, they have's like to be in the country and you know to be a farmer, they have their own livestock in that way, having, you know, multiple dogs and cats inside and outside, doing their own landscaping, lots of DIY projects.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: You know everyone's a DIYer.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: Now it seems they might hire someone to do a few parts of the job, but everyone's got their hands in it.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: Now they want to own what they've done and while all this is happening, there are actually less people working in the trades and so our consumer for Blaine's is changing because I would say in the last 10, 20 years it was a first, second, third generation family farmer.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: Ours today isn't really that anymore.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: You know we still have those people, but we have more growth with first time hobby farmers or homesteaders trying to figure it out on their own, and the farm channel in general is trying to evolve with this by offering, you know, more pet, more outdoor, versus being strictly a farm store.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: We're all trying to build relevance with all these different lifestyles, even with farm in our name.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, excellent.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: So when you look at some of the economic uncertainty now inflation, supply chain there's tariffs, not tariffs.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: There may not be tariffs.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: There's a war, not a war.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: It creates some, you know, consternation kind of noise within the organization, right, so you know what macroeconomic pressures are you seeing kind of potentially impacting your customers and their customer loyalty and even maybe the experiences you're trying to deliver.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're definitely feeling it.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: Everything you said inflation, the supply chain, the tariffs you know we're seeing the same things that you know a lot of the other major players are too.
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: You know we've got a whole slew of national brands from Milwaukee Tool, dewalt, craftsman, carhartt, columbia.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: You know we've got all these brands.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: Some have some component of made in the USA, some do not, some are facing tariff pressures harder than others, so we're all kind of mixed in with all those two.
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: But one of the things that really sets us apart is our private brand and we are seeing a lot of success with private brand and we have for a long time.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: But we're seeing that as our neighbors are trading down, they are moving to the Blaine's Farm and Fleet brand or some of our other private brands that we have throughout the store Snacks and candy, automotive, pet ag and apparel and really when brands or prices are consistent across multiple stores, we are also standing apart because of our customer experience.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: We're staffed, our teams are trained, we have best-in-class NPS.
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: Our loyalty members are finding value in shopping at Blaine's.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: We're seeing a big migration to the website, even in market, where people are really enjoying that experience some of the perks that a loyalty member has when they shop online, with same day delivery, our drive-through experience with pickup at store and even shipping to home.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: We also have our best price promise, which is our price matching program, and that also helps kind of give that reassurance that we're going to continue to serve them with the fair and honest pricing that we always have.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Excellent.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: You know customer loyalty is all that we do.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: The people that are in it are very passionate about it, which is awesome, At least most people.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: When you look at customer loyalty, what does customer loyalty mean to you and to Blaine's Farm and Fleet?
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean for us.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: It's choosing Blaine's.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: You know, even though you're going to pass by several other retailers to get to us, you're still.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: You're choosing us and you're advocating for us.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: You're telling people about your experience.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: You're telling people, oh, I'm going to Blaine's this weekend.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: Or I was just at Blaine's and I saw this and that and you know the other thing too, and I went there for you know the other thing too, and I went there for you know, dog food.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: But I came out with a whole cart full of other things that I didn't realize I needed until I got there and I walked around.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: So it's advocating and it's it's choosing us.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: You know, we know there are hundreds of options where you could shop and get basically all the same things that we have.
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: You know, to some extent, but probably not in one place and definitely not at the same prices and certainly not without the perks of being a rewards member and getting access to some of the other discounts, savings, fulfillment options, things like that.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, your reward program, and I know you have a new offering called FARMS.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: How does that support your long-term vision for building deeper, more meaningful customer relationships?
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean rewards.
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: For us is the key to personalization.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: The data value exchange is what's allowing for those deeper relationships and giving us opportunities to thrive more as kind of that emotional loyalty connection with our neighbors.
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: We have thousands and thousands of SKUs in our stores, but knowing which transaction and browsing history shopping behaviors belong to each individual customer helps us to tailor our offerings, discounting, messaging, to really bring the most relevant information forward so that you don't have to work through the sea of all these things that aren't relevant to you.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: How do you make sure that you know lanes is showing you what you need to see the most, Not necessarily only the stuff you already buy, but also things that you might not know we have that would complement the stuff you're already buying.
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: With farms, you know our best customers are buying a lot of things in bulk, and so what farms is doing on the business side is it's allowing us to confidently fulfill those large orders so we're able to kind of ensure we're going to have the quantity that they need, because these are pretty big bulk orders that are happening every couple weeks.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: How do we make sure the store that they want to pick it up at is going to have it without over inventory at a certain location if that customer doesn't need it anymore?
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: All those things kind of tie together.
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: All those things kind of tied together.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: But then where the, I would say, the bow is at the end is the additional touch points outside of our stores.
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: And that's really where our credit card program helps is kind of having these touch points with Blaine's when you're not with us, when you're at the gas station or the grocery store doing your other errands that we're not there for.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: How do we make sure we're still top of mind?
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: And that's where the card comes into place.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: That's perfect.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: How did customer feedback or shopping patterns or some of the data that you talked about, support or influence the development of the FARMS program?
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, many of our customers are business owners or farmers and, like I said, they're buying these things, items, certain items in bulk.
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: Very frequently the flexible ag rewards member subscription, which is farms, acts like a reminder program.
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: So, if you're buying 20 or more of the same SKU, we need to make sure one we have the inventory to support it when we know you're going to come back and when you need it.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: But we also want to make sure the customer is confirming that before we just send it to that store or charge them for the order, because the last thing you need is a pallet full of things you're not ready for.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: So we really put the control in the hands of our customer with minimal disruption for them.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: With the program.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: It's super flexible in that they are able to skip, they can snooze, they can change the fulfillment reminder period.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: So if they set it for eight weeks and they want it to be six weeks, you know it acts like a subscription program would, without you know the actual commitment to purchasing it, unless the customer has approved it.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: And really where that came from is our customers will complain to us about other auto replenishment programs or subscription programs that they're in it's.
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: I need this stuff, but I don't need it too soon and I certainly can't wait and get it too late.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: I've got animals to feed or projects to work on or businesses to run.
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: I need it when I need it and that's the way it is, and I don't always know exactly when I need it, but I'll let you know, and so our program was designed with all this in mind.
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: It's really not about maximum revenue and maximum margins.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: It's more about having that great experience to ensure they can get exactly what they need when they need it from us.
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: That's awesome At the 2025 Lowell TX about a month ago.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: I can't believe it's been that long.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: Value was a big discussion, right.
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: Value in the brands, value in the program.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: Value internally around the program so it's a pretty big construct in the program.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: Value internally around the program so it's a pretty big construct.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: You've talked about it in the past as well.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: When you look at retail sectors like farm home automotive, there's some price sensitivity.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: There's some potentially challenges there.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: You talk about the private label growth, which is a big push as well, and loyalty dynamics are all kind of shifting.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: They're a little bit fluid right now.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: You know, when you look at customer loyalty, look at the success of your program, you know how has the customer search for value evolved in recent years and how are?
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: How is Blaine's responding to that change?
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think loyalty and pricing strategies go hand in hand.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: We don't have to discount, discount, discount all the time and we certainly don't have to do it at mass.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: Between the margin pressures, map pricing, which is a lot of our national brands, you know, are enforcing certain minimums that have to be met or it has to be above.
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: We have to be able to offer our neighbors discounts.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: You know differently.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: So personalization is coming into play.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: Depending upon where you are in your journey with Blaine's, what role you need us to play in your life, you'll see the right messaging and offerings to fulfill that definition of value, whether it's through a fulfillment benefit with free shipping or same day delivery, if it's through early access, if it's through actual discounts, you know for certain items at different times that are unique to you, versus you know just a price on the shelf.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: The other place where we've got more flexibility that I mentioned earlier is around private label, and while that's always been a shining spot for us that I mentioned earlier is around private label, and while that's always been a shining spot for us, what we're able to do with the private brand is offer the right quality for that price.
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: We're not racing to the bottom.
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: We're not trying to be the lowest price or the cheapest out there, but we will definitely match prices.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: But with our private brand what we're able to do is make sure we're fulfilling the quality expectation.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: That goes into kind of that definition of value.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Understood and when you look at your co-brand private label card offerings, you know how do those play in that process and you know how do you make sure that they're aligned with the needs of your customers, because some brands the card may not be aligned right.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: It may be a high tier card and maybe it doesn't serve the customers.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: I think you guys have really looked at your customers and looked at the credit card offering and have great synergy there.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: How do you ensure that you have that synergy for the program?
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean our co-brand card was launched with the opportunity to award those.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: They are top-tier customers, our best loyalty customers are shopping us very frequently.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: But really what made the difference was we know they're not just shopping at Blaine's.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: We don't have gas offerings, we don't have all of the essentials for grocery.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: We've got a great snack and candy and beverage business but we don't have a refrigerator with eggs and bread or milk.
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: We don't have those types of things.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: So we know you have to go and get gas, you have to go and get groceries.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: How do we continue to award customers for those purchases that they can then come back and buy the things they want or need at Blaine's?
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: And making sure that our card was top of wallet so they're earning extra points at all those other locations in addition to earning more points when they shop at Blaine's.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: And so, while it's a smaller portion of the population that's in the credit card of our total rewards program, they are truly our best and most loyal customers.
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: So those people are getting extra rewards, extra benefits, extra discounts on top of the base program.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: With the base program, you know there's certainly benefits and things that we have, you know, at blaine's, but once you leave that that's it right, like there's no additional touch points outside of the card program to consider Blaine's for other things too.
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: So you kind of lose that top of wallet mentality, which is why we're kind of urging and encouraging people to consider our program.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: We also did a really great negotiation with our card issuer to make sure that we had the best program that really was customer-centric and not necessarily business-centric.
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: So it's not that it's a revenue stream or it's not a revenue stream.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: It certainly is for us, but it's more around the experience for our customer.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: The APR is lower than what you'll see from most other cards.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: So there's a lot of things that went into kind of tweaking the actual card program to make sure it was best in class for farmers and business owners.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: That's awesome and I think that's a big challenge too.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: We hear about that pretty consistently within loyalty 360s, that when you're looking at a new private label or co-brand card, there's two challenges there.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: There's negotiating with the issuer right, do you want to move an issuer?
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: And also do you want to potentially move, uh, kind of from be set a master card or maybe an american express, so having that alignment.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: I think you guys have done a really great job of that and I also best western has talked about some of the things they've done and kind of aligning their car.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: They went with kind of a, a mercury issuer.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: That's kind of a lower credit issue.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: But again, that alignment for the brand is so important.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: I think you guys both did an amazing job in that regard.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's definitely a challenge at times to do those two things, because sometimes what your customer needs is not necessarily what your business needs.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: So you have to kind of pick and choose where you're going to sacrifice for the other cause.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: And having the boldness to go after what the customer needs really should pay off in the long run because it is part of your strategy.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: A hundred percent and I've been using that whole agency issue right Agency.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: The one thing that you learn to market right what's good for like the CEO is making a hundred million dollars a year.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: He may not be incentive the same way the customer, but agency is kind of a big thing right now and it takes a form factor in many different ways and you obviously saw it here and you guys did a great job of doing that, so that's great to hear.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: What's next for Blaine's and what's next for customer loyalty, customer experience.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: You know what are you looking at, what maybe you have an interest in investing in?
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean right now the we have big investments going on from a business perspective, you know ERP and digital platform those things are kind of underway.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: But really, from a loyalty and customer experience perspective, we are really focused on more advanced personalization, more integrations with experiences outside of Blaine's and additional ways to earn rewards outside of purchases.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: So we're focusing in on that emotional loyalty and while our neighbors already have pretty high loyalty to us, we've got work to do to build that same connection with those newer, younger customers and those like third generation farmers, third generation business owners, who are kind of coming into play.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: We can't just assume they know us like you know their fathers and grandfathers and parents and so on.
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: You know, we've got to make those connections and build that trust and a lot of that will come through the relevancy, the experience and personalization.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, at the 2025 Loyalty Expo, were there any presentations you thought, wow, this is amazing, it's something I want to kind of potentially get involved in my program, or that's a new way of looking at customer loyalty.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: Or were there maybe some specific insights that you gathered from the conference?
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's at least.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: Well, there's many, but I'll mention two here.
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: So one Kobe presented on loyalty biodynamics, which is an agricultural approach that takes into consideration all inputs to create deliberate, holistic, self-sustaining farming strategies and us being a farm channel.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: I thought that's exactly what we're trying to do and I need that term.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: So I loved loyalty biodynamics and a lot of what Kobe presented was fantastic.
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: I took a ton of notes from them.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: The other, you know, real tangible element was gamification.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: You know it's been top of our list.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: We've talked about doing different things, we've tested with some things, but really getting into it now you know it's definitely elevated again seeing the different ways customers are using gamification and engaging with their customers.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: But I also really loved the like year-end wrap.
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: A lot of companies were doing that and talked a little bit about that recognition and acknowledgement from the brand to their customers and I think that's really special and something that would be perfect and on brand for Blaine's too.
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: Ok, great, you know what are two or three things you're most proud of with regard to your program.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: I mean how neighbor focused we really are.
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: We're very authentic, we're very genuine, we're true to our roots.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: We talk about Bert and Claude all the time, while still adapting every year, introducing new benefits and new experiences to stay relevant and fresh.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: You know, as we've been revamping our program, we know our customers don't particularly love change and while we launched our program as an MVP, we've been introducing these new benefits and new features to keep it fresh and relevant and I think that's really helped our customers get a better feel.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: For one, they know we're listening and we're making these changes because we hear and see what they're saying and what they want from us.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: So that's been giving us some credibility too, and that just it just makes me excited to kind of hear our customers talking about it.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: You know they will mention the changes that they love, they'll mention the new benefits, they'll mention things and experiences that they get from Blaine's that they don't get anywhere else.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: And the last question somewhat self-serving what?
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: can.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: Loyalty360 do to help you and your team?
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: I know you're very active in the community already, but are there other things that we can do to help your team and your customer loyalty journey?
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: I mean I really love the networking, the roundtables, the webinars, maybe having some templates on the website for like loyalty dashboards, having some templates on the website for like loyalty dashboards or reporting, you know what benchmarks and KPIs you know we should be looking at to kind of help us measure our performance versus the industry.
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: Some of those things might be great to have added, but I really do love the storytelling that we get from the interactions.
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: The website is fantastic.
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: I get a lot of great information from there.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: Having different speakers kind of talk through how they've gone from A to B, what they're hearing and seeing all of that helps all of us.
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: So I think the program itself, the LT360 organization, all the members it's been amazing since I've been part of it.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: Excellent, perfect, and now we have our wonderful quickfire questions.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: I think you've done this once before.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: This is the second set of questions.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: I'm very much looking forward to this.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: How would you describe your work life?
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: Filling.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: I'm fulfilled.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: I love what I do.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: It's different every day.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: I love our customers.
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: I feel very fulfilled.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Excellent.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: If you have a day or a week off from work, what are you doing?
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: And I think we're going to hear this pretty fresh in memory Hiking.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: Now I'm on a hiking kick, yeah, so normally I would say horseback riding, which I also do, but hiking is my thing right now.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, I think that's awesome.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: If you could live in any city country, where would you live?
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: Eastern Tennessee or Northern Georgia.
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: There you go.
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: I'm checking this.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: Northern Georgia being so close to Kentucky, I have a thing for Kentucky and Tennessee, so I'll check the Northern Georgia thing.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, that'd be good If you could go back to school.
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: What would you study?
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: Probably data analytics.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, what facets of your job would you like to know more about?
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: Finance.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: Okay, and is there a facet of the job you would like to know maybe a little bit less about?
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: I wish I didn't know as much as I do about credit card fraud.
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: Everyone's supposed to be good guys, but there's some bad guys out there.
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: A hundred percent.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a big, big challenge, Absolutely right.
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: You know what motivates you when tackling challenges at lanes.
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: I think it's back to just knowing that I'm going to see and hear about the differences we make.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: Our customers are going to tell us that's awesome.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: And what do you draw inspiration from?
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: What differences we make Our customers are going to tell us that's awesome.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: And what do you draw inspiration from?
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: What lights your fire?
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: Kind of the same, you know, knowing that there are millions of people who are trying to live their best life in our country and the United States and they're doing everything they can and I get to be part of the solutions.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: I get to be part of that journey.
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: Okay, and what's your favorite sport or hobby?
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: I think you just talked about hiking and horseback riding, yeah, horseback riding.
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: There you go, there you go Um and uh.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: what do you typically think about at the end of the day?
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: I mean honestly, I do a lot of like, mindful, like just how grateful I am for my family, my friends, my, my home animals, my husband.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: You know the life that we've built, our animals, you know work, those things.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: Well, allie, thank you very much for taking time to speak with us today.
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: It's always a pleasure speaking with you and getting caught up on the Blaine's activity.
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: You guys are always doing some very unique things, driving customer loyalty to extreme heights, so it's great to hear so.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much for taking time to share.
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much for having me Absolutely, and I want to thank everyone else for taking the time to listen today.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: Hopefully you are enjoying the Leaders in Customer Loyalty series, the Brand Stories edition.
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: Join us back every Thursday for a new edition and make sure you subscribe and like and keep coming back.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: So thank you very much.