shopkick 'Mobile Meets Retail' App Goes Android; Available on Android Market as of Today

SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 18, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- shopkick is expanding to the Android™ platform, effective immediately. The free app is the only app in Android Market™ that rewards shoppers for walking into participating retailers, including Best Buy, Macy's, Inc., Target Corporation, American Eagle Outfitters, Inc., Simon Property Group, Inc. malls, Sports Authority and Wet Seal, Inc., and for interacting with partner brand products HP, Procter & Gamble and Kraft Foods.

"Now that the app has been tested by our retail partners and users, we are going broad quickly. Only 3 months in -- almost to the day -- since our launch, several partner retailers have already decided to re-up their investment with more stores and malls, and more shopkick rewards," said shopkick Co-Founder and CEO Cyriac Roeding. "So right in time for peak shopping season, we are also expanding, to Android, letting anyone with the latest Android smartphone turn stores into interactive, rewarding and fun worlds."

How it Works

The shopkick app verifies actual presence by detecting a "shopkick Signal" coming from the shopkick transmitter located in each participating store, and because the detection occurs on the mobile device, privacy is completely under the user's control. Once a shopkick Signal is detected, the app delivers reward points called "kickbucks" to the user just for walking through the door.

kickbucks can then be redeemed across all partner stores for instant gift card rewards or for Facebook Credits to play games online, song downloads, hotel vouchers, the trendiest handbag, or, more altruistically, for donations to 30 different causes and charities and more.

"With our exclusive presence technology, partners can offer much larger rewards to consumers than they would be willing to invest with a traditional 'check-in' application that relies on GPS technology -- because they know their customers are really there, in their stores, seeing their products," continued Roeding. "During the holiday season, it can really add up quickly."

New Platform, New Partners, New Ways to Earn Rewards

shopkick launched at American Eagle, Best Buy, Macy's, Simon malls and Sports Authority stores in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco. Now, with extended presence from launch partners, and the addition of Target and Wet Seal, shopkick users can also earn rewards at participating retailers in Dallas, Houston, Miami, Minneapolis and San Diego. By Black Friday, more than 1,000 individual stores and over 100 of the country's largest malls will have fully deployed shopkick's technology.

In addition to earning rewards for walking into retailers, shopkick has launched its first reward for purchase with HP, offering hundreds of kickbucks for specific product purchases at Best Buy stores nationwide. Consumers can also earn rewards by scanning select Procter & Gamble and Kraft Foods products at more than 230,000 stores throughout the country.

What Shoppers Get

Other shopper-related benefits of the shopkick app include:

• Receive special offers, for example, a discount on specific products at Macy's, Best Buy or Target or in a particular department of those stores
• Collect kickbucks for trying on clothes and scanning a barcode in the American Eagle Outfitters dressing room
• Get more kickbucks for scanning Procter & Gamble and Kraft Foods products wherever they're sold
• Receive special cash card offers at Sports Authority
• Earn kickbucks at every retailer and redeem them at any partner retailer

 

To see how fun and rewarding shopkick can be, download shopkick from Android Market and simply walk into a participating retailer or scan a partner product.

About shopkick (www.shopkick.com)

shopkick is a new Palo Alto-based startup funded by Kleiner Perkins's iFund, Greylock Partners and Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn, and investor in Facebook and Zynga. shopkick, Inc. brings the power of the mobile internet to the retail experience. shopkick launched its mobile application CauseWorld in the United States in December 2009, in partnership with Citi, Kraft Foods and Procter & Gamble, which became the fastest-growing location-based retail app in the App Store within weeks. In August 2010, shopkick launched its flagship service by the same name, the first mobile application that hands rewards and offers to consumers simply for walking into stores and malls. In partnership with Best Buy, Macy's, American Eagle, Sports Authority and Simon Property Group, the largest mall operator in the United States, shopkick introduced its free iPhone application, and immediately reached national coverage by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, ABC, NBC, CNBC, Fox, CNN, TechCrunch, Business Insider and most other major news outlets.  

Android and Android Market are trademarks of Google Inc.

SOURCE shopkick