SA Rocks

Shopping online is growing in SA, people are becoming more comfortable with the thought of giving away credit card details to an invisible person across the world who just might defraud you out of the tens of rands that one might have in a credit card.

Well, I think that process would be a lot simpler if South Africans were getting more out of their money.

Enter Soopa!. This is a website that aims at giving people discounts of sorts. But now before I get ahead of myself and incorrectly explain things, let’s chat to Grant from Soopa!

1. Hi Grant, thanks for answering some questions for the SA Rocks readers. So to kick things off why don’t you tell me, in a nutshell, what Soopa is.

Hi Nic no problem.

in essence Soopa! is a Subscription Based Discount Platform, meaning individuals subscribe to our services and receive discounts accross an extensive range of products and services. We have litterally evolved the old Medical Aid based Loyalty and Rewards programs from the past and made them available to everyone. No more high end medical aid fees in order to enjoy endless benefits and savings.

Over and above our core focus of saving our memebers money we have a secondary, yet equally important componenent, namely the Koalition. The Koalition gives our members the opportunity to come together as one unit and rate the service of not only our partners but retailers or suppliers of any nature. We also secure discounts and savings for our members as a collective unit rather than as individuals. Its the old adage of buy in bulk and save – with a twist.

2. Soopa – which I can only guess stems from the word Super – is an interesting name, how did you come up with it?

we came up with the name fairly quickly. We wanted something that would represent our savings and benifits which we believe are super. We also wanted the name and brand to be fresh , easy to remember and give us the oppotunity to use the infintiy sign which represents our endless savings. So all the parts came together quite nicely and the Soopa! brand was born.

3. Which brands is Soopa currently associated to? It says on your website that people can get discounted prices but from where, is there a list?

At this stage we have in excess of 2000 registered, active partners including Southern Sun, Greyhound, Protea hotels, Ipod, sony, tracker, mens health and many more. We encourage people to visit www.soopa.co.za click on the ‘What you get’ tab and have a look for themselves. We certainly believe all of the visitors will be completely blown away by what is on offer – we are.

4. You’ve chosen to use flash for your website, why is that? Did you consider that many of your potential target market might not have 1) screens big enough to use the site effectively and 2) fast enough access to make the site usable?

Our initial phase of the site is aimed at the online broadband user so it was felt that a little flash interactivity would be a nice way of introducing the brand, as we move and grow this will change to suite a wider range of users, our mobile application is currently underway which will enhance the usability further too.

5. Is there some kind of a sliding scale with Soopa? So the more I spend the bigger my discounts or are you limited to a certain cap?

No, we did consider that, but then we would become another boring loyalty and rewards program ie the more you buy the more you save. We decided to stay true to our core focus and offer the best possible savings to all of our members regardless of their spending habits. All is fair in love and war – and with soopa.

6. Your service is subscription based. Why is this? Generally websites struggle when it comes to getting people to pay for a service. Soopa also requires a R150 monthly subscription fee. Do you think SA audiences are ready for this sort of model?

Most certainly. If you consider that every single person who enjoys benefits on the back of their medical aid is already paying far more that they would for the Soopa! offering anyway. Also the fact that 8 out of 10 American consumers are contracted to one or more discount platform means that we as South Africans should embrace this concept and be more than preppared to spend a little to save a lot. We, as Soopa!, have faith in the new lateral thinking South African consumer and believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that the market will see the value versus cost in our offering.

7. How does one actually receive the discount? Is there a voucher that I download, print out and take with me when I go shopping?

currently the system is voucher based, with the mobile application coming soon. we will also be implementing a card system for our members allowing access to retail level discounts countrywide

8. Grant, thank you again for joining me on SA Rocks for this short interview. I love you idea and hope that it works, I’m all for discounted shopping! If there is anything you’d like to add please feel free!

Thank you so much for the opportunity to tell South Africans about the business we are so proud of. We certainly beleive that South Africa is geared for the shift towards discount platforms and we look forward to steering the shift. We are proud to be South African and we look forward to saving South Africans their money in a time when they need most.

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