Lyft looks to attract new riders with free Starbucks
Attention Starbucks lovers: Lyft is offering free rewards stars and gifts cards in an attempt to translate your caffeine addiction into a ridehailing addiction.
Starting Tuesday, Starbucks customers can link their rewards accounts with the Lyft app to rake in stars. For every ride they take between 5 and 10 a.m. Monday through Friday, commuters will earn five stars.
First-time Lyft users who connect their accounts will automatically receive 125 stars — equivalent to one free food or drink at Starbucks.
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"There's a daily ritual for a lot of people: the day begins with a cup of coffee and a ride to work. Why not pair the experiences together where it helps improve both those experiences for people?" Oliver Hsiang, Lyft's vice president of partnerships, told Mashable.
Indeed, Lyft already knew that its passengers were frequent Starbucks visitors. Starbucks is the most-visited coffee shop for all of Lyft's operation, Hsiang said, with San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago and Orange County, Calif. as the top five markets for Starbucks drop-offs.
The effort is part of an ongoing, multi-year partnership between Starbucks and Lyft. The two companies first announced the partnership in July 2015 and teased an integration with Starbuck's rewards program. This is the first introduction.
As part of the new initiative, Lyft is selling physical gift cards at select Starbucks stores. The cards will be sold at $20 increments and include a free $5 Starbucks gift card with each purchase. Lyft will sell up to 200,000 cards, or $1 million in free Starbucks.
Lyft is only the second company, after Nordstrom, to sell gift cards at Starbucks.
The new physical presence at thousands of Starbucks nationwide will help put the ride-hailing app in front of more eyes, as it competes with ride-hailing giant Uber.
Lyft operates in 200 cities in the U.S. while Uber is present in 450 cities worldwide. Lyft's valuation of $5.5 billion pales in comparison to Uber's $68 billion.
But Lyft, which recently celebrated its fourth birthday, has continued to play-up its brand as the friendlier alternative, and that coincides with the Starbucks partnership.
"Starbucks is famous for investing in their people and thinking of their shared experience and so are we," Hsiang said. "There wasn't any hesitation [in partnering] really."
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Kerry Flynn is a business reporter for Mashable covering the tech industry. She previously reported on social media companies, mobile apps and startups for International Business Times. She has also written for The Huffington Post, Forbes and Money magazine. Kerry studied environmental science and economics at Harvard College, where she led The Harvard Crimson's metro news and design teams and played mellophone in the Band. When not listening to startup pitches, she runs half-marathons, plays with puppies and pretends to like craft beer.
