Here are our timelines of some events that have helped shape Creative Incentives during the many years of our fun and enjoyment gained from our travel incentives, online product catalogues and prepaid debit cards – rewarding for everyone!

1986 – 1990

Geoff chooses to leave his position of Promotions Manager at Tek Electronics after running the furniture and appliance industry’s biggest dealer incentive programme of the time, for Pioneer, Telefunken and Defy. For several years he organised their conferences, exhibitions, product launches, road shows, executive getaways, plus developed themes, produced and managed their incentive programmes. Running the logistics and admin and seeing the delight of the achievers receive their awards is when the travel bug bit!

With a farewell gift of a bar fridge and R5000 into his pocket and a burning desire to go it alone, travel, and create incentive programmes for other industries, he registered Creative Incentives and Creative Conferences, typed up his proposal to Link Pharmacies on a golf-ball typewriter and months later hosted the Top 14 winners and their partners on the adventure of their lifetime in the Okavango Delta in March 1987.

1991 – 1995

Both conferencing and incentives for companies in various industries flourished, with the assistance of not one, but two competent Girl Friday’s. Adding to the travel trips, Geoff personally collected carloads of merchandise rewards on regular trips to the top name brands’ warehouses, while couriers handled regional and national distribution. “Give-Aways” was added as a brand name, specialising in the merchandise rewards and consumer competition prize fulfilment.

Merchandise cataloguing was the rage and Creative Incentives’ stock list was kept on QuickBooks software, so covering two important aspects of internal controls. Incentive travel trip awards were regular, with reality emulating the travel dream. Geoff’s new wife was a whizz on Word and especially Excel, introducing him to the quicker options of computers and printers to replace the golf-ball typewriters and Tippex!

Proctor & Gamble were just one international brand to benefit from our wide-ranging catalogue of rewards and the swift and efficient service that accompanied it.

1996 – 2000

Printed catalogues of merchandise rewards continued to be provided to eager corporate customers, but had 18 month lifecycles – no mean feat to maintain access to stock on those timelines. MTN, Defy and Siltek were just some of the blue chip companies who took advantage of our experience.

Rainbow Chickens ensued with the launch of 109 new lines, and our administration acumen meant their sales figures per line, per store, per region and so on remained 100% accurate, resulting in their achievers enjoying their travel trips from the wide selection on offer.

The worldwide competition between Monsanto and Pioneer HiBred continues and in 1999 we were charged with getting not only the dealers to purchase Pioneer’s bags of seeds, but also to speak to their customers, the farmers, about the Pioneer seed advantages. Unique, different, well-accepted and focused, we helped Pioneer reduce debtor’s days, cross sell their various ranges and increase overall sales.

We launched a warehouse-clearing incentive for Appletiser, with a combination of merchandise with their first travel trip – both elements were a huge success.

Coffee was on the boil with a fantastic incentive to the supplier’s coffee farms in Brazil, which National Brand’s salespeople got to enjoy to the fullest.

Meanwhile we launched an incentive for a Reunert Group subsidiary, CBI Electrical, which had the trade well-focused onto their brand versus competitors for several years – and increased their business.

Crest Chemicals was an interesting incentive – increase the sales of bulk chemicals, through staff attention to detail – and it sure worked well to clear their warehouse floors of tons of base chemicals.

We ran a dealer incentive for Epson Printers that proved to be really successful in the industry, using pages of merchandise rewards and a trip for the top dealers achieving their targets.

The Cisco conference was really interesting, with a local SA flavour, travelling by coach to Mpumalanga to 5 star luxury and generating a lot of excitement for the winner’s trips.

We ran a really great Air Products recognition and reward programme for all staff which included a focus on sales staff too.

Canon came to us for several years, and we planned their themes and managed their invitations, launches, teaser mailers and results to help drive their sales further.

We implemented a superb trade incentive for L’Oreal which really helped ‘turn heads’  and got the salons focused onto L’Oreal’s range of hair products for the entire duration. The benefits of incentive programmes long after they are completed cannot be emphasized enough.

Westcon is a large IT distributor who reaped the benefits of being one of the first in their industry to run a dealer incentive programme, utilising unique ‘movies’ into their incentive emails to gain the excitement needed.

All this activity meant more staff, which meant more office space, so a move from Randburg to Sandton ensued.

2001 – 2005

This was a watershed year in our existence, where Geoff decided to begin marketing CI in new ways. He wanted industry-specific education for his staff, so joined SAACI and SITE and began networking and attending conferences and seminars overseas.

He joined the local Committee of SITE becoming SA Chapter President (Chairman) from 2004 to 2006. From 2007 to 2014 he served as Treasurer. Attending the international SITE seminars overseas are highlights of anyone’s career in motivation and incentives and is a surefire way of keeping up with trends, research, networking and information.

Meanwhile Nokia contracted us to handle their dealer incentive programme for handsets, which saw this brand increase their market share beyond expectation.

Cell C came to us as a brand new company in the marketplace, and from brief to presentation in 3 days, we won the business. We went on to manage their conferences, incentive administration and travel programmes for several years.

We designed and managed several travel incentives for Plascon which proved so successful that Plascon continues to implement incentive trips to this day.

Festo Pneumatics enjoyed a tremendously successful incentive trip to Singapore, while those who didn’t quite ‘make it’ earned the items of their choice from our merchandise catalogue tailored specifically for them.

There’s a place for incentives to drive sales in every industry and the glass trade is no different. We ran a few for Shatterprufe which shattered a few of their sales records.

2005

Creative Incentives bought into Red Envelope, one of the few Experiences suppliers around at that time, to answer the growing demand for lifestyle experiences as rewards. This spawned Red Engine, a pioneer of the Concierge space for companies, providing a wide range of products and services, including discounted travel packages. In 2008 they moved out to become independent again and Geoff no longer retained any shareholding.

Having moved to a different office block in Randburg, ‘Reward Building’ was named and companies from diverse industries enjoyed the Key Account Management  expertise that Creative Incentives provided across all facets of incentive programme requirements.

2006

Creative Incentives incubated the start-up Plus Points – and Point One – a rewards website for the IT industry, growing into news and reviews in the distribution channel. CI provided a wide range of support services in return for the intended shareholding. In 2009 they too moved out to become fully independent.

2007

Creative Incentives bought the entire business of Leading Incentives (Pty) Ltd, an IATA licenced travel company specialising in incentive travel groups. This came with a set of blue-chip, mainly financial clients, and more clients were added.

2007

And so Creative Incentives grew again, with many clients using store gift vouchers in their incentive mix of travel, merchandise and cash reward scales. Having travelled to international incentive seminars and expo’s, we noted the trend of retail store gift vouchers converting into plastic gift cards, so in 2007 we launched our own E-wards and Gift Bucks MasterCards as the answer to the growing corporate needs for a reloadable, ‘spend anywhere’ prepaid debit card, with a helpline and statements available at all times.

It’s success soon meant that we spun off cards into a separate and independent Pty Ltd company in it’s own name of Gift Bucks. Company-branded cards were also produced – and still are – via the banking channels for companies who want their own name in incentive participants’ pockets.

We also offer international versions of prepaid MasterCards to cater for those companies with reward needs across Africa, or around the globe.

2009

At the end of 2009 Geoff discovers a management coup d’etat plot in Leading Incentives and moves swiftly to take over full control again. Clients for whom incentive groups had been handled for many years so were thought to be loyal, leave, so Geoff and his team spend the next few years rebuilding the incentive groups business back to it’s former levels of top client names and profitabilities.

2010

Acknowledging the global economic downturn and the cutback on incentive budgets that it produces, the company moves to smaller premises in Broadacres. At the same time Geoff invests into and forms SA Travel Card (Pty) Ltd, an online travel agency with a unique Club Membership providing cashback into member’s MasterCards.

2006 – 2010

Spar store owners were tasked to achieve new levels of biscuits and tea sales, and needed to send in photos to support their claims of promoting the brands. A tiered choice of exotic destinations was dangled as their reward – and record sales was the result!

Sony Ericsson wanted to increase their market share and be seen to be supporting their new world sponsorship of the Women’s Tennis Circuit. So cellphone stores were exhorted to display the miniature tennis courts we produced, guys and gals in tennis gear roamed around the shopping malls giving away peaks and sweatbands – all resulting in the incentive winners jetting off to Zurich to watch the Women’s Tennis Final – an incentive at it’s best!

PartQuip is a big motor spares supplier for whom we ran several incentive programmes – invitations, launches, teaser mailers, leader boards, computer screensavers, trips, everything that an incentive should be.

Gree Air Conditioners experienced what a big difference a well constructed incentive could make, by contracting us to produce and manage their dealer incentive programme.

Nissan has always had SalesPro as their themed method of reaching their dealerships. We refined the process, communicating regularly in ‘incentive-speak’ to all DP’s, Sales Execs and Parts personnel. Additionally, we introduced lifestyle experience rewards for bakkie sales and watched with Nissan management as sales grew year on year again and again.

Hyundai wanted to change their dealer incentives away from cash and into merchandise, so we created a Filofax diary (remember them?) containing loose leaf updatable info on all models and including all the motivating aspects of their programme and it’s wide range of merchandise rewards available on a sliding scale of achievement.

LG consistently rewards store salespeople for selling their products, and we launched specific incentives for specific product ranges, successfully achieving their objectives each time. We improved the communication by turning black and white memos into colourful, motivating themes.

Motorola ran successful handset incentives in dealer stores throughout SA. We invented the ‘Moolah’ name for their cash rewards and they saw their market share grow as the incentives developed over time.

The sales team on HP at Axiz Technology Solutions had the use of our web-based rewards catalogue and also used our Prepaid MasterCards to reward the sales people who achieved their varying levels of sales in different campaigns.

We designed a rewards card system for Total using prepaid debit cards for their staff in their own petrol station shops. The Total Top Up card was born with the byline “It all adds up”. The idea was to test the programme with us before commencing several years later with the rollout of their consumer loyalty programme.

SAB was an exciting incentive project to work on – eliminating the shrinkage in rewards delivered to warehouses from previous incentives, ensure the taverns were engaged, drive up sales across various brands and so on. Success for everybody.

We supplied prepaid MasterCards to the BMF – Black Management Forum – as a means for them to offer benefits to their members.

The BIC incentive proved to be a colourful way to beat targets and get rewarded for it.

We had become somewhat of a success in understanding the mobile handset trade and what worked best to generate an increase in sales. So HTC employed us for a long time to drive up brand focus and sales across their various models.

A motor lubricants company called PS23 entrusted us with managing their incentive on every bottle and can of fluid sold in all stores in retail chains across the country – and rewarding each person behind store counters in cities, towns and dorps alike. Amazing what instant cash into our prepaid MasterCards can do!

Even an office interior design company called BCS Design saw the need to reward clients with their choice of merchandise from the rewards website we customised for them.

A brand that everyone in our industry seeks out is Samsung and we collated their sales on all audio, video, TV and camera models every day, for several years. Administration efficiency plus customising our prepaid debit card into the Samsung Sales Achiever card for them, meant the length of time they used to reward their dealers in, was immensely reduced – which meant more focus and attention onto their brand.

One of the Big 3 cement manufacturers in SA is AfriSam and we helped them improve safety at their depots for a long time.

2011 – 2015

2012 sees a necessary move to larger premises again, this time centrally located near the highway in Bryanston.

As the needs for staff recognition and rewards grow, Creative Incentives’ peer-to-peer employee nomination system grows to include automated Long Service Awards, Year End Awards, Product Training and Research Poll sections plus Newsletter and other facilities.

2013

With an objection to the name of SA Travel Card lodged by one of the major banks, the company rebrands into Alacard Travel – which spawns offshoots into other areas of simplifying rewards while giving the customers a wider choice, such as Dining Out and Hotel Accommodation deals.

This is also the year for new product development, putting Geoff’s ideas into production. Conference Rewards is developed under the Leading Incentives brand, as a ‘no-brainer’ for companies to place their conference business through Leading Incentives and receive R1000’s worth of free product value for their delegates. Also very useful for hotels, lodges and B&B’s to generate loyalty from customers and fill empty beds. Or for any company wanting to reward their supplier or customer base.

To ensure that it’s online merchandise rewards system remained full of the popular and latest products across all categories of everyday items, Creative Incentives outsourced the catalogue management function to Brands4you (Pty) Ltd.

2014

By early 2014 Geoff completed buying all Brands4you’s shares, which added the well known and growing consumer website of Luxury4Less into the mix, supplying a myriad of everyday products and specialty items at really good prices.

After two years in the planning and development, Geoff was asked to invest in a unique platform of insurance replacements fulfilment for the insurance industry. Called Sure Settle (Pty) Ltd it provides a platform that eliminates paper, fast tracks claims quotes, ensures best-price selection by the insurers and actually provides a revenue stream for them that they have never had before.

Unique Sure Codes ensure fraud is eliminated, reducing insurer’s risk factors, with no third party payments necessary ensuring product suppliers are paid directly. An industry first that requires no IT integration for cash settlements via Sure Codes, operating in any retail environment with no integration costs.

2015 – 2020

We have continued with the highly rated group travel trips for Avroy Shlain achievers for over 13 years, taking them to magnificent experiences in destinations around the world. When they were added to the Tupperware group, Tupperware achievers then also enjoyed the smooth operations and extras we added into their incentive travel trips.

Creative Incentives looks forward to engaging with more clients who want to feel the positive difference in their bottom lines.

“For Best ROI’s – Incentivise!”