Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

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Alpha8472
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Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by Alpha8472 »

If you join you get unlimited ice or hot tea, coffee, fountain drinks, and other drinks. If you sign up before May 6, you get free drinks until July 4. Then you get charged $10.99 a month.

Panera must really be desperate now. However, before July 4, will they lose tons of money just by giving out free drinks?
babs
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by babs »

Alpha8472 wrote: April 21st, 2022, 7:26 pm If you join you get unlimited ice or hot tea, coffee, fountain drinks, and other drinks. If you sign up before May 6, you get free drinks until July 4. Then you get charged $10.99 a month.

Panera must really be desperate now. However, before July 4, will they lose tons of money just by giving out free drinks?
Coffee, tea, and soft drinks are cheap for restaurants to provide. The money is in alcohol and espresso drinks. If it attracts a few people, probably not a bad deal. But If they are struggling, this isn't the turnaround plan.
storewanderer
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by storewanderer »

babs wrote: April 21st, 2022, 8:04 pm
Alpha8472 wrote: April 21st, 2022, 7:26 pm If you join you get unlimited ice or hot tea, coffee, fountain drinks, and other drinks. If you sign up before May 6, you get free drinks until July 4. Then you get charged $10.99 a month.

Panera must really be desperate now. However, before July 4, will they lose tons of money just by giving out free drinks?
Coffee, tea, and soft drinks are cheap for restaurants to provide. The money is in alcohol and espresso drinks. If it attracts a few people, probably not a bad deal. But If they are struggling, this isn't the turnaround plan.
Haven't they had a coffee subscription for years? I feel like I kept getting a free coffee for a month loyalty offer from them a few years ago when I was traveling more and then it turned into marketing for a coffee subscription. Also got some free bagel every day offer for a while, those were terrible, could use their bagels as a hammer; total garbage.

One thing to consider is the nature of this program, there is little to no labor involved to implement it. The frequent customer can go in, order via kiosk, get their own cup, and then since the drink is self serve they can go through this drink claim without ever talking to an employee. For people who work in a place where they have to walk by a Panera going to/from work, and even go in for a drink once or twice a week, signing up for this makes complete sense.

All of the beverages they are offering on their subscription program are self serve beverages and you can get a free beverage every 2 hours. If you are dining in you can have as many refills as you want since these are self serve beverages.

Some of these drinks also have relatively short hold times (like the coffee), so if they end up just having subscription customers show up and fill cups vs. throw stuff away it may work out. It is one less step to clean out an empty urn.
BillyGr
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by BillyGr »

storewanderer wrote: April 21st, 2022, 11:18 pm Haven't they had a coffee subscription for years? I feel like I kept getting a free coffee for a month loyalty offer from them a few years ago when I was traveling more and then it turned into marketing for a coffee subscription. Also got some free bagel every day offer for a while, those were terrible, could use their bagels as a hammer; total garbage.
I know there were signs for such an offering here when I was in a couple times between Jan and Mar (hadn't been to one prior to that in some time). So it is at least an existing program, the free part may be a new thing to advertise it, though.
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by buckguy »

storewanderer wrote: April 21st, 2022, 11:18 pm
babs wrote: April 21st, 2022, 8:04 pm
Alpha8472 wrote: April 21st, 2022, 7:26 pm If you join you get unlimited ice or hot tea, coffee, fountain drinks, and other drinks. If you sign up before May 6, you get free drinks until July 4. Then you get charged $10.99 a month.

Panera must really be desperate now. However, before July 4, will they lose tons of money just by giving out free drinks?
Coffee, tea, and soft drinks are cheap for restaurants to provide. The money is in alcohol and espresso drinks. If it attracts a few people, probably not a bad deal. But If they are struggling, this isn't the turnaround plan.
Haven't they had a coffee subscription for years? I feel like I kept getting a free coffee for a month loyalty offer from them a few years ago when I was traveling more and then it turned into marketing for a coffee subscription. Also got some free bagel every day offer for a while, those were terrible, could use their bagels as a hammer; total garbage.

One thing to consider is the nature of this program, there is little to no labor involved to implement it. The frequent customer can go in, order via kiosk, get their own cup, and then since the drink is self serve they can go through this drink claim without ever talking to an employee. For people who work in a place where they have to walk by a Panera going to/from work, and even go in for a drink once or twice a week, signing up for this makes complete sense.

All of the beverages they are offering on their subscription program are self serve beverages and you can get a free beverage every 2 hours. If you are dining in you can have as many refills as you want since these are self serve beverages.

Some of these drinks also have relatively short hold times (like the coffee), so if they end up just having subscription customers show up and fill cups vs. throw stuff away it may work out. It is one less step to clean out an empty urn.
Yeah, they've had this in the past. The coffee wasn't very good so I wasn't tempted. The one near me struggled against a better coffee place almost next door and closed shortly after COVID hit.
Alpha8472
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by Alpha8472 »

I wonder how they enforce this. Why can't someone just keep filling up more drinks than 1 per 2 hours?

What if you don't like a drink and you pour it out and fill up another? Refills are unlimited, but how do they enforce it so you don't give drinks to your entire group of people.

I should just sign up and keep visiting my local Panera store throughout the day.
Alpha8472
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Re: Panera Bread Unlimited Sip Club

Post by Alpha8472 »

I signed up for the club and it was easy to redeem at the kiosk. You log in with a phone number and order a drink and checkout. The price goes to zero and you have an option of an email receipt or paper receipt.

The cups were next to the kiosks. There was no employee checking receipts or anything at the drink counter.

Apparently, anyone could use your phone number every 2 hours. I found the soda selection to be limited to Pepsi drinks. The other options were different flavors of lemonade, teas, coffee, etc. The drinks were decent. The rest of the food was so over-priced. I did not find anything appealing.
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