"The gift card and voucher industry continues to be a vibrant place for innovation and creativity, allowing brands to stand out from the crowd and engage with both consumers and businesses. "
Gail Cohen, Director General at the UKGCVA
Zeek, the UK’s biggest gift card marketplace, was recognised as the Overall Industry Winner at UKGCVA Summer event and Hall of Fame awards. The event highlighted the achievements of major brands and industry service providers and their work with gift cards in 2018.
Zeek’s work on providing a platform for consumers to buy and sell gift cards across the country made them stand out in the industry this year, with M&S highly commended by the judges in this category. Zeek also received joint victory alongside One4All, for the much sought after Best UK Creative Marketing Campaign.
Alongside Overall Industry Winner, five other categories were included in the 2018 awards: Best B2B product or service, Best B2C Programme, Best Industry Partnership Initiative 2018, Industry Service Provider of the Year and Industry Retailer/Issuer of the Year.
The winners were as follows:
Best B2B product or service
Winner - Love2Shop
Highly commended - Reward Cloud
Best B2C Programme
Winner - One4all
Highly commended - M&S
Best Industry Partnership Initiative 2018
Winner - PPS and Reward Cloud
Highly commended - Nitecrest and M&S
Industry Service Provider of the Year
Winner - CPI
Highly commended - PPS
Industry Retailer/Issuer of the Year
Winner - M&S
Highly commended - One4all
Returning to the Hall of Fame awards this year was the Most Innovative Technology Product or Service and the member elected Honoured Industry Contributor. The winners were:
Most Innovative Technology Product or Service
Winner - PPS & Debenhams
Highly commended - Reward Cloud
Honoured Industry Contributor
Winner - Eoin Whyte, Sales Director at Savvy
Highly commended - Siobhan Moore, Partner, Global Head, Cards & Payments at Locke Lord
Best UK Creative Marketing Campaign
Winner - Zeek and One4All
As part of its ongoing work with the Alzheimer's Society, the UKGCVA also hosted a raffle for its members to donate to the charity, raising £1300 in total. Among the prizes were John Lewis Style & Beauty Experience and a three-course meal for two at Marco Pierre White's London Steakhouse Co. at the The Shard.
The main sponsor for this year’s Hall of Fame awards was Nitecrest, with Sodexo, SVM, Zeek and Blackhawk Network as supporting sponsors.
Gail Cohen, Director General at the UKGCVA says: “These awards are an opportunity for our members to celebrate their successes and campaigns from the past year. The gift card and voucher industry continues to be a vibrant place for innovation and creativity, allowing brands to stand out from the crowd and engage with both consumers and businesses.
“Following from the success of last year’s awards, we wanted to provide more opportunity for our members to showcase and celebrate their achievements as well as highlight other important areas of gift card growth such as B2B product offering and innovation. All nominees deserve huge congratulations for their work and we look forward to growing the event for 2019.”
