Guide
Gift cards bring cash in early and new faces through the door. Loyalty brings back the people you already have. Both are simple if you keep them simple.
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Merchant Fund Express explains payments in plain English so owners can make better decisions about equipment and processing.
Gift cards bring cash in early and new faces through the door. Loyalty brings back the people you already have. Both are simple if you keep them simple.
A gift card program needs three decisions: denominations, where to sell them (counter, online) and what you will do to promote them in the weeks before holidays. A loyalty program needs one: what a customer earns and what a reward costs you.
Start small. A punch-style reward or a points rate you can explain in one sentence is better than a clever system nobody understands.
Sell at the counter and online, with holiday promotion and an easy balance check.
Pick a simple earn rule and a reward customers can reach in a few visits.
Ask at checkout on the customer screen or handheld.
Check redemptions monthly to see whether the program drives repeat visits.
| Program | Good fit | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Gift cards | Holidays and tourist-heavy shops | Outstanding balances |
| Points | Frequent small purchases | Complex earn rules |
| Punch card | Cafes and quick service | Lost cards (digital helps) |
| Birthday offers | Personal services | Collecting dates with consent |
A neighborhood cafe offers a free drink after ten purchases and sells gift cards at the counter in December. Customers who joined at the register come back more often, and the card balances bring in new visitors.
A device or pricing decision looks bigger on paper than it is in practice. Most owners are well served by choosing for their busiest ten minutes, keeping the first setup simple and adding pieces as volume proves the need.
Call (305) 384-8391 and tell us how you sell. We will explain the options in plain English, give you a personal quote and review your current statement for free. There is no price list to compare against, because the right setup depends on your business.
Review the program after a month and again after a quarter. Count cards sold and redeemed, new customers who joined and the share of transactions tied to a customer. If the numbers are low, the usual cause is that nobody asked at checkout, which is a training problem and not a technology one. Adjust the script and review again.
As explained by Merchant Fund Express. Updated 2026.
Ecommerce and invoicing tools can sell digital gift cards.
They can join at checkout with a phone number or email.
No. Configure the rule once and review it monthly.
Gift card rules vary by state. Ask your accountant or attorney.
From approval to live is typically 24 to 48 hours in the DFW metro and 5 to 7 business days nationwide, depending on your location and the readiness of your menu.
Clover can accept payments in offline mode for a limited time and sends the stored transactions when the connection returns; ask us how the limits apply to your account.
Call Merchant Fund Express. We install it, train your staff and stay on the line after launch. Ask for a free rate review while you are at it.
