Q&A: Josh Rathour, MD at UNiDAYS

Josh Rathour, MD at student discount business UNiDAYS, explains how he works with partners to create an effortless and seamless experience for customers in-store and online.

Explain how your business started:

UNiDAYS launched in the UK & Ireland in 2011, creating a student verification platform that now powers the online student discount functionality for retailers.

The vision was for UNiDAYS to become the source of free all-year round student discounts for all major brands and service providers. It is free for students to register on and use MyUniDays.com. The student discount source gives a range of online discounts which students can use as many times as they like.

Due to the success of its service, the business now has a growing network over 80 major retailers across the UK & Ireland, US, Australia, New Zealand and Denmark.

Who are your customers and what do your partners sell?

ASOS was one of our first partners and still is one today. When we started working with the major fashion retailer in 2011, many others followed including Topshop, Topman and Boohoo.com.

We help these retailers reach 18-24 year olds and drive significant web traffic and sales from this lucrative market. We work with partners from a range of industries too. Just some include: H&M, Gap, New Look, Office, Urban Outfitters, UGG, Spotify, Hobbycraft, Paperchase and Firebox.

We market every partner offer that we have negotiated with to our active user base via web, mobile, app and social media channels, plus our growing email database of over 2.5 million 18-24 year olds worldwide.

Is the concept new, if not how have you developed it?

It is similar to a service launched by the NUS, but students have to purchase an NUS Extra card if they want to get student discounts online. Many retailers therefore went to UNiDAYS because they realised they were losing a lot of potential student customers who weren’t willing to pay for membership.

Our verification process is a unique technology used principally to power online and offline student discount functionality. It instantly checks an individual’s student status meaning no manual checking or waiting around for a card to be delivered. Being free and instantly accessible to all students within each operating region means that partners can maximise their student reach.

In what ways do you work with partners to combine in-store and online?

Our intention has always been to make the shopping experience as easy as possible for students – whether they shop in-store or online.

Users create their own account and after they are verified as a legitimate student (taking less than 30 seconds) the student uses this set of credentials to access persistent student discount with all partners.

This means that any student in the UK, Ireland, US, Australia, New Zealand and Denmark can start benefitting from up to 50% student discounts that UNiDAYS has negotiated with its major partners.

We have also created an app, which retailers can use as part of its student acquisition strategy.

Students simple show their Photo iD via the UNiDAYS App to receive exclusive student discount when shopping in-store on the high-street. The mobile app is free to download for iPhone and Android devices. If a student is new to UNiDAYS, they can join via the app and start redeeming the discounts in seconds.

Users can access all in-store discounts and redeem them at their favourite retailers by showing their Photo iD on the app to the cashiers.

In what ways does your set-up help to optimise sales?

The platform allows for fast and easy implementation across ecommerce channels of all sizes. The solution is built for retailers, which can be integrated within their own sites (including mobile and apps) to manage their student discount programs.

This gives them all the benefits of UNiDAYS’ free and fully-accessible verification process conveniently within their own site, to provide a trusted and recognised service that this key customer group now expects.

Our partnerships with these brands are ongoing, so the student offers are ‘always on’.  We have agreements with all our partners that they will operate a minimum of 10% student discount at all times (where appropriate) and we work with them to identify key seasonal periods when students are looking for higher levels of student discount.

We do not promote short term, one-off or daily deal discounts. Our users know that our promotions are always there and as a result of our direct service relationship with our retailers are up-to-date and will work.

On average, a partner retailer sees a 30-50% uplift in student customer acquisition.

For more visit: www.myunidays.com