Pret a Manger staff can hand out free coffee

Pret A Manger has ditched the idea of a loyalty card and has adopted a new, alternative method to keep customers coming back for more coffee. They’ll be handing out free cups of coffee, snacks and sandwiches to customers on an ad hoc basis.

“It’s totally random, maybe if someone’s extra nice of if they are a regular, of if they’ve bought a lot of things. There’s no rule,” explained one London based barista.

Another employee, speaking to The Guardian, said that patrons had to be ‘charming’ in order get a freebie. “Or, sometimes, if we see tired or unhappy customers we give them a free coffee to cheer them up.”

Clive Schlee, Pret a Manger’s CEO, admitted that each store and staff member has a certain number of hot drinks and food items that they can hand out on a weekly basis. And it’s up to the staff to determine who they give it to.

It turns out that this practice isn’t exactly new and it’s worked: Pret announced that they had a bumper year of trading, revealing that sales were up 16% to just shy of $900m compared to last year.

One shopper, when asked about the policy, noted that she was a little disappointed about the announcement, though did agree that “it’s always nice to get something for free.”

The author and brand psychologist Jonathan Gabay believes that Pret a Manger has “made a big mistake.”

“Knowing that a branch has a certain amount of coffees to give away kills the authenticity of the moment. When consumers begin to realise there’s actually a strict process [behind] these moments, suddenly the gesture doesn’t ring true.”

But, with that said, it’s unlikely to put people off.

However it could raise the question: Why didn’t I get a free espresso this morning?

Pret a manger Licensed under CC BY 3.0