Instead of New Year's Money, Gift Cards... GS25 Sales Grow 80% Annually

[Asia Economy Reporter Minyoung Cha] As the culture of gifting prepaid gift cards spreads, sales related to convenience stores are also increasing.

GS Retail announced on the 28th that since introducing prepaid cards at its convenience store GS25 in 2014, related sales have grown by an average of 80% annually.

POSA cards, which stands for Point of Sales Activated, differ from paper gift certificates or bank-issued card-type gift certificates in that customers select from various gift cards available at the point of sale, and upon payment, the card is activated in real-time and can be used at the corresponding brand as an anonymous prepaid gift card. A representative product is the Google Card.

They are also popular as gifts for acquaintances instead of New Year's money. Looking at sales data during the Lunar New Year holiday period, sales related to POSA cards increased by about 39% in the two weeks before Lunar New Year 2020 (January 13?26) compared to the same period the previous month. GS25 provided gift envelopes to customers who purchased POSA cards during this year's Lunar New Year period.

Meanwhile, GS Retail and Korea Prepaid Card held a business agreement ceremony on the 15th of this month to develop new partnership products and activate the gift card platform. Through this MOU, they agreed to cooperate on ▲ adding new payment processes for POSA cards through system improvements ▲ developing differentiated new partnership prepaid cards ▲ improving effective promotion to enhance customer awareness ▲ operating POSA card pop-up stores to activate the payment platform through prepaid cards.

A GS Retail official said, “GS Retail, visited by 5.5 million people daily, and Korea Prepaid Card, leading the prepaid card industry in Korea, have joined forces to activate the payment platform through prepaid cards,” adding, “We will strive to bring positive effects to customers' lifestyles by providing differentiated value and services to customers.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.