Why they chose the Sunderland Gift Card
Ocado Retail Hub staff earn ‘Ocadough’ which they can spend on employee platform Mint. The Mint shop opens three times a year. In 2023, Ocado Retail switched from Amazon vouchers to the Sunderland Gift Card for staff to buy through Mint and to use in ad-hoc rewards. Before making the switch, Ocado hosted workshops for staff to show them the businesses on offer through the card. Staff were happy with the mix of big name brands with local independents.
Benefits
With 60% of the Ocado Retail team living and working in Sunderland, the Sunderland Gift Card offers choice and flexibility for their team and is also a way for Ocado to give back to their community and show their support for a range of businesses in the city. The feedback from staff has been strong with the Sunderland Gift Card becoming the top selling item in the Mint store. Staff have been able to use their Sunderland Gift Card to buy lunch from Greggs, to save up to buy Christmas presents from JD Sports or their Christmas PJs from Primark.
It was a lightbulb moment when we thought ‘why are we using Amazon vouchers when we could be putting money back into the city?’ The feedback we’ve had from staff to the Sunderland Gift Card has been really positive. Colleagues are happy and prefer the Sunderland Gift Card to the Amazon vouchers we used in the past. It’s the small things that have the biggest impact and for us the Sunderland Gift Card offers choice and flexibility for staff, with support for local as part of our community ethos.
Experience of using the card
As well as offering the Sunderland Gift Card for staff to buy in the Mint shop, Ocado Retail used the Gift Card to buy physical gifts to stock the Mint shop. Another initiative used by Ocado Retail to reward and recognise teams is giving staff displaying team values a mug containing treats and a £10 Sunderland Gift Card to buy themselves a coffee. Team leaders were also given the card and a choice of 4 local restaurants so their team could enjoy a festive meal together, generating 97% staff satisfaction with the initiative. Ocado Retail Hub order a batch of Sunderland Gift Cards from Miconex as required, ready to hand out to staff.
Staff feedback
With their reward and recognition strategy closely aligned to employee feedback, and reviewed every 6 months, Ocado Retail were able to obtain feedback about the card from their team which was overwhelmingly positive. Post pandemic, staff really enjoy the experiential aspect of the card; they can go shopping on a Thursday night, go for a meal as a team or use it in any other way they choose, which feels more meaningful and more personal to them than other rewards.
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