My favourite coffee shop is actually a tea shop. The kind with rows of glass jars filled with loose leaves from every corner of the world, and a scent that makes me wag my tail and float from jar to jar like a cartoon bloodhound.
Their house coffee bean is my secret indulgence. Roasted with vanilla pods, it is rich and comforting, and when I bring it home it makes my house smell like creme brûlée.
Over the years I’ve recommended this place so many times that people must think I’m on the payroll. I have in-jokes with the staff about whether I can get commission on referrals. In the customer hierarchy I have risen through the ranks from “regular” to “loyal” to “brand ambassador”.
Dropping in to the shop has long been part of my weekend rhythm. It is close enough to walk to from my house, but since I spend my weekends operating a shuttle service for small humans, I generally park somewhere semi-legal, run in for my sacred beans, and try to be back in the car before the backseat mutiny erupts.
A few months ago, the local Council changed the road layout, cutting off my usual bank-robbery-style getaway. The new route would add a crucial 60 seconds to my access point and force me to park around the corner, meaning I would either have to leave my volatile accomplices unattended and out of sight in the getaway car, or bring them in on the heist. Both high risk options.
It was enough to compromise the whole operation. So I pulled the plug. Picked up a bag of generic supermarket beans. Just this once, I told myself, as I walked away and didn’t look back.
And now it’s all over…today I’m an average nobody. Get to live the rest of my life like a schnook. I downgraded my coffee shop status from from brand ambassador to occasional customer. And asked myself some hard questions: If I’m fickle enough to let such minor friction affect my custom, does my loyalty come with a “subject to convenience” asterisk?
What else in my life would I be willing to discard due to minor traffic disruption?
It’s possible I’ve been mistaking routine for loyalty all along. Choices I once chalked up to my discerning quality radar, or a deep connection with a brand’s identity, were really just the result of habit. Or worse, inertia. After all, autopilot demands far less brainpower than conscious preference.
Maybe consistency is my coping mechanism. A soothing comfort blanket I wrap around myself as the chaos of modern life hurls crockery at my head. Given the average adult makes 35,000 decisions each day, declaring myself loyal to a certain product or brand is a tiny shortcut along the exhausting marathon of daily choice.
Which would suggest I’m not really craving connection, I’m just craving fewer decisions. And somewhere along the way, I’ve convinced myself that not resisting is easier than choosing. A cow in an endless pasture being willingly nudged towards the greenest grass.
Traditionally, the cattle prod of choice for brands has been the “loyalty” program. We spend money, and in return they give us points, perks or a free panini maker.
But if we’re only loyal because there’s something in it for us, is that really loyalty, or just an elaborate treat-dispensing machine? Spend enough and the brand gives us a biscuit. Who’s a good customer? We are. Yes we are.
These programs aren’t rewarding us for our loyalty; they’re paying us for our compliance. Can anyone really be paid to be loyal, any more than you can be paid to love, or paid to be happy? Surely, the very definition of such principles excludes this kind of transactionality? Maybe it’s time for brands to stop referring to “Loyalty Programs” and start doling out “Obedience Rewards.”
As consumers, it’s uncomfortable to think of ourselves as mindless cattle or Pavlovian dogs. We look in the mirror and see principled free-thinkers, champions of sustainability, defenders of independent business. We nod sagely at behavioural science studies that point towards the importance of emotional connection and shared brand values as key factors in our purchasing behaviour.
And yet, if those values truly governed our behaviour, then how can we explain Amazon?
Amazon doesn’t waste time trying to make us “loyal”. It doesn’t need to. There are no points or freebies. No heartfelt ad campaigns trying to convince us it “shares our values.” Why bother making people feel emotionally attached when it’s enough to make their lives easier through one-click purchasing, next-day delivery, and a seemingly limitless inventory of products.
Despite the mountain of reasons not to shop there, we continue to click Buy Now to the tune of £27 billion per year, like the ethical goldfish we are.
What Amazon understood early, and executed flawlessly, is that for any time-poor consumer (which covers most of us), convenience will always outweigh loyalty. We pretend our purchases reflect our values when really they reflect our schedules.
On the high street, this truth hits hard. Small Business Saturday might win hearts, but Black Friday empties wallets. Until such time as technology (like, say, I don’t know, Loqiva?) aligns the customer experience, this will always be a fight between weight classes.
Of course, this logic conveniently legitimises my treachery towards my local tea/coffee shop. It offers me up as a victim of system inefficiency, a rational actor responding to hostile circumstances, a tragic figure in a Kafkaesque consumer labyrinth. Let the record show: I ain’t no rat. Capisce?
One of these days, my schedule will allow me to sneak my coffee fix back into my weekend routine. And I’ll shuffle through the door like a cheating husband returning to the family home after being kicked out by his mistress, begging forgiveness for a mid-life indiscretion. It didn’t mean anything, I’ll insist, there was never any emotion.
They’ll take me back because they have to. The baristas will exchange glances that say how can we ever trust this guy again? The stench of betrayal hanging in the air.
Because I’ve shown my true colours now. I’ll always be the guy whose loyalty card has the “subject to convenience” asterisk on it.