Published August 2003

Family Bundles:
marketing for small biz

Snohomish County Business Journal/JOHN WOLCOTT Chad Grembos, owner of Godfather’s Pizza on Mukilteo Speedway, is promoting his business with the new Family Bundles marketing plan recently launched in Snohomish County by Kim Vogler (right), company president, and Mary Bingaman of Stanwood (left), the regional manager for the program.

By John Wolcott
SCBJ Editor

There are more than 16,000 businesses in Snohomish County. Most of them are retailers; many are independently owned businesses. If you’re one of them, how do you rise above the crowd, become well known and develop loyal customers who will make your venture successful?

Kim Vogler thinks she has the answer: her marketing program called Family Bundles. And several Snohomish County businesses have signed up to help prove she’s right. If she is, her program may become an exception to that old caution, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”

What sounds so good about Vogler’s low-cost promotion plan is that it promises to make small businesses more visible in a highly competitive marketplace, increase their sales, build shopper loyalty and even pay customers to shop with them. Family Bundles even produces revenue for its merchant members when their customers shop at other members’ businesses.

The plan can also contribute money to customers’ favorite charities. Or, charities can pass out the cards themselves to raise money through the shopping their friends, staff and supporters do. A part or all of the rebate check amount would go to the charity. Her own company has already chosen to contribute a portion of its earnings to support the Everett Gospel Mission’s shelter for women and children.

Here’s how it works, according to Vogler, a lifelong marketing professional who used her skills and experience to develop and test-market the ideas she and her late father, Frederic G. Horn, created to help small businesses prosper.

Independent business owners pay $400 to $1,000 for a lifetime advertisement in the Family Bundles promotional advertising booklet, or in a new entertainment booklet focused specifically on dining, recreation, travel and area bed-and-breakfast stays.

Proprietors ask shoppers to sign up for free “cash reward” cards. They only need to provide identifying information that’s used to mail “rebate” checks to those who use the Family Bundles card. Vogler said the information won’t be sold to marketers.

When card-holders buy meals, flowers or a stay at a bed-and-breakfast from participating merchants, customers get bonus points added to their account each time they swipe their card’s magnetic information strip through the machine on the retailer’s counter. Customers collect one point — worth 6 cents — for every $3 they spend at a Family Bundles member business. Multiplying the monthly spending of hundreds or thousands of card-holders is what makes the program attractive. For each $750 worth of merchandise or services they buy, consumers receive a tax-free $15 rebate check from Family Bundles.

Merchants will be billed 15 cents for every $3 a card-customer spends in their store, which provides a 6-cent rebate to the customer, 1 cent to a charity, 3 cents to the merchant who signed up the customer for the program, 3 cents to Family Bundles, 1 cent to the local Family Bundles regional manager and 1 cent to the company’s fund for promoting its members.

Aside from that split, Family Bundles has its own pool of co-op funds to help its members with their own advertising of Family Bundles, up to as much as 20 percent.

“Some of the media think we’re trying to take away their business, but we’re willing to pay co-op money to help our members advertise our program,” she said.

As the program develops, Vogler said, the pennies turn into dollars, for everyone. She knows the program will be successful because most of the spending that fuels Family Bundles comes from purchases consumers would make anyway — for restaurant meals, dry cleaning or vacation getaways.

Each month, retailers receive a computer printout of their card sales so they can see the impact of the Family Bundle program. If a merchant isn’t profiting from the program after a year, Vogler refunds the business owner’s original investment, a commitment she doesn’t feel she’ll ever need to fulfill.

“We’ve already proven the program’s worth in West Seattle, where one restaurant owner found that customers who used to eat lunches once a week before they got their Family Bundles card are eating there three times a week. Now we’re launching it in new areas — in Everett, Mukilteo and Marysville — then other towns,” she said.

The program’s popularity with retailers was evident when Vogler and her Snohomish County regional manager, Mary Bingaman of Stanwood, invited new business members to talk with the Snohomish County Business Journal about their hopes for the program.

“A big part of the program’s success comes from members promoting each other’s businesses within their own core groups, like the ones along the Mukilteo Speedway,” Vogler said.

“I jumped on it because I see it as a win, win, win situation for my customers, my business and Family Bundles. It’s a great way to keep our name out there with the public,” said Ray Bigelow, owner of Blue Ribbon Pet Salon on Mukilteo Speedway.

“This is a program for small businesses who don’t have a lot of capital for promotion and can’t afford to give away discounts to get business,” said Michael Handley, co-innkeeper with his wife, Melissa Hsu, for Camano Blossom Bed & Breakfast on Camano Island.

Hsu, who also owns and operates Lotus, a Chinese restaurant on Mukilteo Speedway, said advertising has become a growing expense.

“Handing out cards to customers to promote our business is no problem, and other (Family Bundles) members will help promote us, too,” she said.

For Chad Grembos, owner of Godfather’s Pizza on Mukilteo Speedway, the cards look like a way to help establish him as an independent business owner.

“Most people don’t know that I own this restaurant; it’s not a corporate business, so I give a lot more service and run it a lot differently. I’m hoping the cards will help distinguish me from my competition,” he said.

Bingaman said Family Bundles works best when business owners are willing to promote it with their customers and take advantage of every opportunity to promote other members’ businesses.

“My program just gives business owners one more promotion tool, but they may find it replaces some efforts that aren’t cost effective for them,” she said. “Results are what counts.”

For more information about Family Bundles, visit online at www.familybundles.com or call 888-209-0077.

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