Papa John's sold more than one million pizzas on Super Bowl Sunday last year, without advertising during the game despite being the NFL's official pizza sponsor.

Its promotional stunt — offering free pizzas to its rewards program members if the 2011 Super Bowl showdown between the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers went into overtime — hinged on the safe bet that that Super Bowl games have never gone into overtime. Loyalty members were also randomly selected every 45 seconds for a $45 gift card.

This year's Super Bowl promotion for the pizza chain takes from that playbook while trying to sweeten the incentive.Continue reading...

You want to go check out some serious water polo at the Olympic Games this summer in London but don’t feel like ponying up a boatload of cash to make it happen? Well, you just might have the opportunity.

United Continental Holdings has announced that it will let its loyalty-program members use their points to bid on events and experiences, such as tickets to attend the London 2012 Games, entry to concerts, and other hot tickets, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The new auction site, Mileage Plus Headliners, sets minimum bids for experiences, with a ski trip to California’s Mammoth Mountain that includes a private guide starts at 27,000 miles while four tickets to see the Chicago Orchestra starts at just 5,000 miles. Other experiences to bid on include “an opportunity to train like a pilot in United's flight simulator in Denver” and the possibility of being one of the first travelers on the Boeing Dreamliner when United gets delivery of that plane.Continue reading...

Most consumer retail brands may have been battered by an economy in which said consumers are increasingly stingy with their money, but luxury brands have continued to make headway. While luxury products are not completely immune to an economic downturn, they have certainly weathered the storm better than most. That's because these are the brands that appeal to the upper echelon consumer who recognizes quality and is willing to pay for it.

But even in the luxury category, there are winners and losers, relatively speaking, which is something the Luxury Institute, a global research and CRM consulting company, studies quite carefully. The Luxury Institute analyzed more than five years of data from its surveys on dozens of luxury goods and services categories in an effort to identify "best practitioners" that have consistently scored above their competitors.

In handbags, a leading luxury category, the Institute found that "one brand stood alone in owning several critical metrics for brand vibrancy five years in a row." That brand is Coach.Continue reading...

Fans and admirers of the Green Bay Packers have inundated the team's phone lines and website (which redirects to packersowner.com) today to order up to 250,000 "shares" in the Super Bowl champion's latest sale of "stock" for $250 apiece.

The catch — well understood by everyone who snapped up the stock certificates — is that the shares aren't actually worth anything, including any scintilla of true ownership in one of the National Football League's oldest most storied franchises. The ultimate helm of the not-for-profit entity is held by an American Legion post in Green Bay in a complicated matrix of "public" ownership that is too long to be explained in most stock prospecti.

The bottom line is that the stock sale, the team's first since 1993, is entirely symbolic, a chance for the so-called Packer Nation of fans to express appreciation and support, mainly.  But the proceeds are very real, and the team expects to raise at leaset $20 millon that will go toward a $143-million expansion plan for Lambeau Field including a new sound systrem, new videoboards and the addition of as many as 6,700 seats.Continue reading...

Virgin America is in a bona fide social media crisis as it makes the switch to Sabre for reservations. Richard Branson's hip, business-oriented U.S. carrier, a darling amongst sophisticated travelers, recently made the change to accommodate increased business, but its online booking system is wreaking havoc on passengers changing or canceling flights, making seat selections, or checking their frequent flier accounts. 

“We are really the first airline that has gone through this type of business change in the era of social media,” commented Virgin spokeswoman Abby Lunardini to Venture Beat, which reports that the tech woes have been raising hackles among Silicon Valley tech execs. “It’s a knife-edge cutover because you have live operations. You have to move everything over to the new system at once.” Good thing the carrier has a new head of marketing to run damage control.Continue reading...

Shell Oil Products U.S. has had a lot of success with its two-year-old Grocer Rewards program, which allows consumers to get discounts on gas depending on how much they spend at participating grocery stores. So now the Houston-based company is expanding on the idea with its new Fuel Rewards Network, according to Convenience Store Decisions.

“What we are aiming for with FRN is a program that is even bigger than just grocers—one that goes into all the other spin categories that the typical family has and allows them to earn fuel rewards based on those other purchases,” said Dan Little, Shell’s North America Fuels and Forecourt Marketing Manager, according to CSD. “Those fuel rewards can be redeemed at all Shell stations, not just the 8,000 Shell units that have a grocery partner.”

Consumers simply get a FRN loyalty card at a Shell station and then register it online, where they can find a list of participating retailers and also download a mobile app to make their phone into a loyalty card.Continue reading...

Swagbucks, a website that rewards users with virtual currency for online actions, is on track to hit $25 million in revenue this year. Its four million users garner “Swag Bucks” for playing games, watching videos, shopping online and searching the web.

They also got in on Cyber Monday with the announcement: “Black Friday may belong to the store, but Cyber Monday belongs to us. In addition to continuing to run our killer Black Friday Deals, we’ll have additional sales, something new for SBTV and, of course, we’ll be announcing the winner of $2500 in Amazon Gift Cards from our Swagbucks Pays For Your Holidays, and giving away more prizes, of course.” 

Major brands including Target, Wal-Mart and Gap are paying when users click on ads or redeem coupons using the Swagbucks toolbar. Calling itself “the web’s premier digital dollar,” the online rewards destination has the distinction of being founded by a rabbi.

CEO Josef Gorowitz embraces his background in Talmudic scholarship and runs his business according to the Biblical idiom, “Treat your fellow man as you would treat yourself,” according to Bloomberg.Continue reading...

Airlines have taken to sponsoring teams in England’s Premier League recently. Etihad Airlines signed on with Manchester City in July. Emirates Airlines has its name on Arsenal’s stadium. And Turkish Airlines has a deal with Manchester United.

Great promotion for the airlines, right? Well, there are a few that get turned off when a brand sign on with a team: the fans of that team’s rivals.Continue reading...