In a news release by Lifespring Health, a credit card and rewards provider, they recently announced a new credit card with an interesting rewards twist. As everybody knows, the cost of health-care and fitness activities have been going up and up with no true end in sight. Lifespring Health internalized this consumer dilemma and created a rewards program to go with their new credit card that enables cardholders to apply points they accumulate with the card to health service, prescription, elective surgery, gym membership, wellness products, and contributions to Health Savings Accounts (HSA) and many other related services. The problem as I see it is that the program only works with 275 online retailers. If you look at the demographic of people who worry about healthcare costs (45+ years old) and the demographic of avid online shoppers (<45 years old), there isn’t as much overlap as one might hope. Maybe I’m misreading the press release. If not, I don’t see this program catching on very much since the target demographic for this Lifespring Health credit card simply does not shop online. For those who do, the frequency and dollar volume is probably so low that they won’t have too many points to apply toward their next prescription. Overall though, it’s a great idea and certainly addresses a consumer pain-point. With enough tweaks to their model, they could really have something here. It reminds me of other programs targeted at college savings or retirement savings by the likes of Upromise or NestEggz.
