Tretakoff Musings

 As some of you know, I've spent over 15 years in the customer loyalty space. So, when I come across a new retail loyalty program, I can't help but see the pluses and minuses. After this many years, it's kind of ingrained. Periodically, I'll share my thoughts with you. Today, it's Kohl's turn under the scope. Let's have a look, shall we? I've divided the review up into three sections: what's good about the program, what's bad about the program, and what I'd change about it. That last one has some actual value: I charged hundreds of dollars per hour for loyalty program consulting, and had over a dozen clients, before I moved to JustAnswer FT. But, being a pandemic and all, I'm giving it away for free here. Kohl's, you're welcome. Here we go! The Good Sign up is opt in Seems odd to praise Kohl's for this, but in department store loyalty, this is a rarity, and a smart one. It means the customers who are opted in are already prime...

Atom Films had an article that really hit me hard. It seems that Scott Gustin , who covers entertainment, went to the opening of Avengers: Endgame a year ago, in Los Angeles. Like all of us, he had been waiting for this film for seemingly forever, but Scott did something I bet none of us did: he recorded the sound of the crowd reacting to the film. Cool, right? Now, take a moment to visualize a year ago. No people trapped in their homes, worried about illness or financial uncertainty the likes we've never seen. Responding to Trump's latest with a roll of the eyes, rather than a frustrated scream. No overwhelming frustration leading to riots at state capitals . And no horrific illness, robbing us of friends and family, in a wave not seen in a century. No, in this time, early April of 2019, we were watching Trump still bitch about his border wall. Over in Ukraine, a country most of us hadn't really thought about, they were electing a comedian as president, and we...

It is said that in any time in history, the winners and losers are determined when a unique set of circumstances arises the requires an unprecedented response. How a company responds to those conditions can often propel them to new heights, or sentence them to an ignominious end. This post is meant to be an ongoing and often updated list of those that may come out of the Great 2020 Covid19 Lockdown as champs...or chumps. Winners Zoom How is it that, with all of the video conferencing choices in the market, a relatively obscure one (and a freemium one, to boot!) ran away with the title? Think of it: you had entrenched competitors like Skype and Facebook, as well as work-focused like Microsoft Teams , Google Hangouts , and Amazon Chime , any one of which had far greater reach than Zoom . Yet Zoom won, to the point that they achieved the exalted state of having their product/platform become a verb ("I'll Zoom you later"). More amazingly, they even continued their gro...

Disclosure: I consulted for OpenTable for some time. Every now and then, restaurant reservations juggernaut OpenTable sees an article about how their stranglehold on online reservations is under attack. The latest is this article in SFGate , and follows the usual narrative: OpenTable is too expensive, plucky startups are trying to show there's a better, more restaurant-friendly way to do business, and maybe one of them will be a success. There were a raft of "pay for play" reservations services that would allow the diner to prepurchase vouchers that would get them a seat; most of them have gone away (although Reserve , in this piece, has clearly pivoted from that). There was SeatMe , a really innovative product, which was gobbled up by Yelp years ago. There were even efforts by credit card companies to provide a concierge to do this. And this is the latest. But most of these articles miss the point altogether. Put yourself in the shoes of a restaurant owner: you ...

Like many people, I was very excited by the prospect of Coin , a credit card replacement that offered the ability to combine multiple cards into a single one, selectable with an encoded switch, working with any credit card reader today. Like others, I got in on the ability last year to preorder it at a 50% discount for $49, with a proposed shipping date of the "summer." All was good. Throughout the wait, Coin has been very cool, providing "VIP only" password protected updates, truly making you feel like a special customer. The updates, though a little light on details, were honest, insightful, and good. Then, as summer began and there was no word on dates, it started to feel a little uncertain, but hey, we'll see, right? A little over a week ago, a news update! Great news: iOS users would get access to the app by the end of August; Android, by end of September. As an Android user, this is pretty depressing, as this was the first hint that there was some so...

On a recent trip, I was able to fully try the new service from Flightcar . If you are a regular reader of Tretakoff.com, you heard my excitement about the concept . For a refresher, Flightcar allows you to rent out your own car when traveling, in return for free airport parking, and a cut of the $ if your car is rented. Since I was traveling from San Francisco to Boston, I was able to test out the full range of Flightcar's operations, as those are the only two cities they currently operate in: in San Francisco, we made our car available, and in Boston we rented a car. So, how did it go? Some prelude first. When we made the reservation for the car rental in Boston, Flightcar's site allows you to choose your car and rate, a very appealing feature. You can see photos of the exact car, get a description, and more. As I mentioned in my previous post, we chose a 2009 Lexus GS sedan, at roughly half the price of a Nissan Versa economy car from the traditional rental agencies. V...

Would you rent your personal car out to a traveler? That's what Flightcar , a new company operating out of San Francisco and Boston, want to help you say "yes" to. What if I told you your car would be covered by a $1 million insurance policy? And that you'd get free parking at the airport? And that you'd get free valet curbside service to your flight and when you arrive? And that your car would be professionally cleaned before your arrival...for free? Not convinced? Ok, tell you what: what if I throw in a $10 gas card? OK, that answers the question of why you'd want to list your car. But what about renting a car? Would you choose Flightcar? Why? For an upcoming trip to Boston, I priced rental cars out: the least expensive for about $500 for a compact for the time I will be there. Flightcar? How about a swanky 2009 Lexus GS for less than half that? You even get to see a picture of the car, learn about its owner, its description, mileage, and they throw in ...

On the heels of today's leaked info that Yahoo is buying Tumblr for $1.1 billion comes the news that some folks think that's too little . Tumblr earned a whopping $13 million in revenue in 2012; that's right; not $30 million, not $300 million: $13 million. Essentially, they are being bought for an almost 85x of their earnings. And someone is complaining? Tumblr offers a lively photo-based blogging service...for free. It is quite active, and has a lot of users, which explains Yahoo's interest. And yes, Tumblr has burned through the cash, all $125 million of it. With 18 whole employees, and millions of users, it still couldn't generate enough revenue to hold on for more than a few more months...and Yahoo gives it a massive exit...and someone is complaining? On the heels of Facebook's completed $1 billion acquisition of Instagram (12 employees), and it's imminent $1 billion acquisition of GPS app Waze (80 employees), it's pretty clear that $1 billi...

Facebook's big introduction today of Graph Search set off all sorts of seismic waves across multiple companies. Investors reacted with gloom and doom in a variety of companies as big, bad, Facebook announced their intention to introduce a "third pillar" of their business by allowing users to search relevant Facebook friends' recommendations and relationships. The question is: why? Before I get to that, a note about today's announcement: a very smart move by Facebook to take advantage of that wealth of data they know about you in a way that doesn't make you scream and run for the hills, and is actually engaging. Also, impressive move to put it in equal importance to their existing News Feed and Timeline products, the two most identifiable aspects of Facebook. No wimpy "beta" labels here; they are making their intentions quite clear. The problem I forsee is that search is, in essence, a mechanism to "pull" information: you have to ask...