Chipotle Mexican Grill knows well the power of its 24 million rewards members. Those most-loyal diners have helped propel the fast-casual burrito brand to more than $2 billion in digital sales so far this year.
Chipotle’s latest initiative, announced Wednesday, seeks to harness that power to drive even more traffic.
The chain debuted an enhancement to the Chipotle Rewards program called Extras. It makes a game out of earning points and collecting achievement badges after completing personalized challenges.
“For us, the Chipotle Rewards members, they really are an important part of our business,” Jason Scoggins, director of customer relationship management and loyalty, told Restaurant Business. “We know they have higher frequency than non-loyalty member guests … We’re trying to build up that overall community because we do know there’s a significant impact on business.”
The rollout of Extras comes about two months after Chipotle launched its Rewards Exchange. The major loyalty program revamp allows customers to redeem points for a wider variety of items. Beyond just free entrees, diners can now earn lower-point rewards such as free guacamole or higher-value items like Chipotle merchandise.
“It’s going great. We’re really seeing a lot of engagement,” Scoggins said of the Rewards Exchange. “When we were looking at the evolution of rewards, we were talking about this being a summer of rewards, with the one-two punch, starting up with Exchange and following up with Extras.”
The rollout of Extras shows just how far Chipotle’s rewards program has come since it launched in 2019. In February 2020, weeks before the pandemic began, Chipotle Rewards had just 8.5 million members. It has grown nearly three-fold since then. At that time, the Newport Beach, Calif.-based chain, which has more than 2,850 locations, was dipping its toe into one-to-one marketing, using a promotion called Guac Mode to incentivize loyalty sign-ups.
The pandemic, of course, accelerated digital business at nearly every brand. For Chipotle, digital sales made up 48.5% of all business during its second quarter, a slight dip from the prior quarter when fewer of its dining rooms were open.
With the Extras launch, rewards customers will be given a range of tasks to complete to earn points and badges. Challenges will include “aspirational” as well as more “attainable” goals, he said.
Customers may be tasked with making three orders in a certain amount of time, visiting a wide number of Chipotle locations or visiting at lunch if they’ve been absent during that daypart for a while.
To kick off the program, everyone will earn double points on purchases through Friday. Typically, Chipotle Rewards members earn 10 points for every $1 spent.
“Starting next week, we’ll have different segments of customers, broken out by various things” who will receive different challenges under the Extras program, Scoggins said.
Planning for the upgraded rewards program started about a year ago as they chain looked for ways to acquire more loyalty customers and then to engage them once they’d signed up, he said.
“We know we’ve got some big opportunities to unlock,” he said. “It gets to the core of what our customers want out of the program. Chipotle is all about customization and choice. This is the ultimate customized experience.”