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February 27, 2009
By Dave Burgess
Vice President, Great Lakes Scrip Center
If you haven't tried reloading your gift cards at ShopWithScrip.com, maybe it's time you gave it a try. Find out how one normal scrip user learned to love reloading gift cards.
Read Dave's confession here.
December 8, 2008
 One of the best ways to grow your scrip program's sales is to help your participating families convert more of their regular weekly spending into gift cards from your program. To do so, you need to offer a vast variety of gift cards, from more retailers.
With the American Express Gift Card your families can now shop at retailers that do not offer their gift cards in our program. It can be used at over a million stores around the country, including Target and Costco. It can also be used at many of your local grocery stores that we don't carry, such as Publix and Kroger.
Typically, universal types of gift cards carry expensive activation or usage fees, but not this card! With the American Express Gift Card your families will earn a 1.25% contribution for your organization and, just like with every other card we carry, your families pay only the face value.
We have developed a special promotional "3-up" to help you promote this exciting new gift card to your member families. It is available at glscrip.com, under Promotional Tools, or you can access it by clicking here: American Express Flyer. Print these out and share the great news with your families!
Note: The American Express Gift Card is available exclusively from Great Lakes Scrip Center.
November 24, 2008
Some of you have called and e-mailed us asking about alarming stories on the internet and in the press recently about gift cards and retailers going out of business. We thought we'd share some thoughts on this subject.
There's no doubt that in this economic climate that even the most successful retailers may find they have stores that aren't doing well. The prudent business thing for them to do when that happens is to close that location. They typically provide some advance warning of a closing. This does not necessarily mean that the entire chain is in danger of closing.
You should know that we keep very close tabs on any of our retail partners that we think may be in financial trouble. If we feel there is a significant risk of them closing, or not accepting their gift cards, we will stop selling their cards. We take our role seriously as a leader in the gift card business, and we fiercely protect the interests of our non-profit clients. When and if we have important information about our suppliers, we will do the best we can to quickly and clearly share that information with you.
All of our retail partners are doing their best to deal with a softening economy. The best thing we can do right now is to continue to support the retailers who have supported our scrip programs in the past. You should also know that some of the information in the e-mails that are out there is exaggerated, or completely untrue.
We hope this helps with any uncertainty you may have. As always, we appreciate your business, and wish you a happy and profitable holiday season.
Sincerely,
Dan Springer
President
Great Lakes Scrip Center
September 13, 2008
It's not unusual for many GLSC customers to rack up 60% of their annual scrip earnings in the traditional holiday shopping season. But this year, your traditional holiday season will be cut short. And if you don't plan ahead, your scrip program may suffer.
Learn what you can do to prepare for the "Holiday Calendar Crunch".
August 5, 2008
By Tim Koenigsknecht
Director of Customer Development, Great Lakes Scrip Center
"Can I pay for my scrip with a credit card?"
If you're like most GLSC coordinators, that's a question you hear all the time. For many families, credit cards are the preferred way to shop, as they accumulate rewards, airline miles and rebates. It's difficult to convince these families to participate in your scrip program if you can't accommodate their preferred way to pay. The problem is, the freebies that entice families to pay with credit cards, aren't really "free". Find out more about the ugly math of credit cards.
August 6, 2008
By Tim Koenigsknecht
Director of Customer Development, Great Lakes Scrip Center
In part one of "The Trouble With Credit Cards", we shared the ugly math of credit cards and true costs to your scrip program. We showed you how typical merchant fees can consume almost 40% of the average scrip program's profit. And we showed you how families who purchase low margin gift cards with credit cards can even cause you to lose money! Learn more about battling this fiscal foolishness
March 6, 2008
By Laura Tew
Great Lakes Scrip Center
At only three years old, the SCRIP program at Holy Cross School in Dover, Delaware is growing by leaps and bounds. Christine Simon and Maria Shroyer took over the fledgling program two years ago and have developed seven ways to better their program. Read how they did it. Read The Full Article
October 15, 2007
By Ginny Weidner
Great Lakes Scrip Center
Divine Mercy School in Faribault, Minnesota has always had one of the leading scrip programs in the country. They have been a strong customer of
Great Lakes Scrip Center customer since 1998 with 160 to 170 families who participate in this Pre-K thru 6th grade school. Not surprisingly, Divine
Mercy was one of the first schools to begin using GLSC’s free ShopWithScrip online scrip management tool.
Read The Full Article
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