Competitive Cyclist suspends Strava credits program

[djg21]

http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/04/news/competitive-cyclist-suspends-strava-credits-program_367475

In an email to customers, Competitive Cyclist wrote:
“When we came up with the idea to pay you a dollar an hour to ride your bike through our partnership with Strava, it was pure, it was simple, and it represented everything we stand for. Apparently you liked it too, because you signed up by the tens of thousands and told everyone you knew. We had expectations and you blew them out of the water.

“Because of this we’ve had to pause new sign-ups, and we must stop issuing new credits beginning tomorrow, April 21. We’re already hard at work on a revised program that can support many, many more people. We will update you with the details of this revised program on May 19.

“If you have earned money, it’s yours to keep and we encourage you to put it towards something great. Those credits will expire on May 31 at 11:59 pm MST.

“Because you’ve already connected, when the program resumes, you’ll be ready to roll. We won’t do anything with your data and we’ll maintain the privacy policy we’ve always held.”

[sandyrs]

http://forums.thepaceline.net/showthread.php?t=166306&page=6

[tiretrax]

Not surprised. And, Matt Tuck - I hope you can get them to let you teach it as a case study. It shouldn't have been too hard of a call to figure out it would sink the boat if not revised significantly. They only have to look at airlines to see how the loyalty programs had to be flipped over to keep the points liability from becoming the largest item on a balance sheet - certainly many times more than goodwill or owners' equity.

[Mark McM]

Another case study could be Groupon. Sometimes, a Groupon deal is too good, and a vendor gets swamped with more business than they can handle - all with little to no profit, due to the deep Groupon discount.