What is a wallet coupon?
A digital restaurant offer the guest opens on their phone, with a code and a QR code. Staff scan the code at the table — no app, no login.
- Code and QR on the phone
- No app needed
- Every redemption logged
- Code and QR on the phone
- No app
- QR redemption
- Single-use
- Email reminder
- Guest profile
What the coupon looks like to the guest
The guest taps a link and the coupon opens on the phone, with a code and a QR code ready to show. There is nothing to download and no account to create.
- Opens on the phone, no app to download
- No account, no login
- Tied to the guest profile from the start
A reminder keeps the coupon from being forgotten
A reminder by email or text reaches the guest before the coupon expires, with the link to open it. A forgotten coupon becomes a lunch decision at 11:40, not a missed offer.
- Reminder by email near expiry
- Link straight to the coupon on the phone
- Lock-screen reminder and geofence trigger on the way
One scan, and the coupon is spent
A wallet coupon redeems in a single QR scan at the table or counter, then logs to the guest profile as used. The same offer cannot be claimed twice, and the record shows who came back.
- Redeem in one scan at the table
- Logged to the guest profile
- You see who actually came back
The same offer, a very different life
A wallet coupon and a paper coupon carry the same discount but behave differently in the guest's day. Side by side, the gap is plain.
- Lost in a pocket or buried in the inbox
- Cannot be edited after it goes out
- No reminder — the guest has to remember
- No record of who redeemed it
- Opens on the phone with a code and QR — no app
- Controlled from the guest profile, closeable anytime
- Reminder by email near expiry
- Every redemption logs to the guest profile
What defines the format
What is a wallet coupon?
A wallet coupon is a digital restaurant offer the guest opens on their phone, with a code and a QR code. The guest shows it at the table or counter, and staff scan the QR code to redeem. It needs no separate app and no login, you control it from the guest profile, and you can send a reminder by email or text before it expires.
The term carries two meanings online, so disambiguation matters here. On US shopping sites a "wallet coupon" often means a discount code for buying a physical wallet, like a leather billfold or a card holder. This page uses the loyalty-marketing sense: a digital coupon a restaurant sends a guest to drive a repeat visit. Saving the pass straight into Apple Wallet or Google Wallet — with a lock-screen reminder near the restaurant — is on the way as the next step.
Why does a wallet coupon matter for restaurants?
A wallet coupon matters because it survives the moment a paper coupon gets thrown away. Paper coupons get lost; emailed PDFs get buried under forty other emails. A wallet coupon stays on the guest's phone, and you can send a reminder by email or text right before the visit it was built to trigger.
Redemption is the whole point, because an offer no one uses costs you only printing and time. Say you send 500 lunch coupons: if the wallet format lifts redemption from 3% on paper to 10% digital, you go from 15 to 50 claimed visits on the same send.
The figures are an illustrative calculation — real redemption varies by channel, offer, and segment. The direction holds either way: a coupon on the phone with a reminder beats a coupon in the trash.
Higher redemption on the same offer means a cheaper repeat visit. The guest is already in the relationship, and a wallet coupon makes the step from offer to booked table shorter than an email that vanishes in the feed.
What are examples of wallet coupons?
Wallet coupons come in a few common forms, each tied to a different goal: a discount coupon lowers the price of one visit, a lunch coupon fills weekday midday, a stamp-card reward counts visits toward a free item, and a win-back coupon reclaims a guest who has drifted. All open on the phone and redeem with the same scan.
- Discount coupon — a one-time amount off the next visit, such as $8 off lunch, to earn a first repeat visit.
- Lunch coupon — a wallet coupon aimed at midday demand, steering visits to the tables between 11 and 13.
- Stamp-card reward — a digital card that counts visits, where the tenth lunch is free, so the coupon and the loyalty card are the same object.
- Win-back coupon — an offer triggered when a regular has not returned in a while, often timed to interrupt the drift away.
A lunch spot with 40 seats that turns tables twice between 11 and 13 fills 80 covers at full capacity. Issue a lunch coupon to past guests and win back even five covers a day, and you add 25 covers a week with no extra marketing spend. The numbers are an illustrative calculation, not measured results.
What terms relate to a wallet coupon?
- Stamp card — a digital card that tracks visits toward a reward, often issued alongside coupons.
- Lunch coupon — a wallet coupon aimed at weekday midday demand.
- Guest retention — the repeat-visit outcome wallet coupons exist to drive; covered on the restaurant loyalty hub.
- Loyalty program — the system that issues, tracks, and redeems wallet coupons over time. See how to build a restaurant loyalty program for the setup steps.
- More definitions live in the Goboblo glossary.
How do restaurants use wallet coupons with Goboblo?
Restaurants use wallet coupons in Goboblo as the redeemable layer of a loyalty program. Each coupon ties to the guest profile built from bookings, so the same guest record that holds a reservation holds the coupon. A booking and a reward stay connected on one guest.
That connection is the part a standalone coupon tool misses. Because Goboblo runs booking and loyalty in one system, a wallet coupon reaches a guest the restaurant already knows by name, not a line on an anonymous list. See how you create and send wallet coupons in practice, see how the pieces fit on the loyalty programs page, or read more terms in the glossary.
Common questions about wallet coupons
Does a guest need an app for a wallet coupon?
No. The guest opens the coupon in their phone's normal browser, so there is nothing to download, no account to create, and no login. Saving the pass straight into Apple Wallet or Google Wallet is on the way as the next step.
Can you change a wallet coupon after it is issued?
You control the coupon from the guest profile and can close or pull an offer at any time. That sets it apart from a paper or PDF lunch coupon, which cannot be touched once it goes out. Real-time updates to a pass on the guest's phone come with the native wallet pass.
How do staff redeem a wallet coupon?
Staff scan the QR code on the guest's screen at the table or counter. The redemption logs to the guest profile right away, so the same coupon cannot be used twice and you can see exactly who claimed the offer.
What is the difference between a wallet coupon and a paper or PDF coupon?
A wallet coupon opens on the phone with a code and a QR code, redeems in-store with no app, and logs to the guest profile, so you can see who used it. A paper or PDF coupon gets lost, cannot be edited after sending, and leaves no record of who redeemed it.
Want to drive repeat visits with wallet coupons?
Book a short demo and we'll show how a coupon is issued from the guest profile, opens on the phone, and redeems at the table in a real restaurant flow.