From "we don't have one" to more than 600K members in 44 days: how KFC Spain built a loyalty programme that converts
KFC Spain launched El Club de la Hucha, a gamified four-tier loyalty programme, from scratch. In 44 days from soft relaunch, the programme's target CRM segment grew by 2,971% - to over 600,000 contacts. More than a registration play: 40.6% of members have already transacted - signup-to-active-buyer conversion rate. The entire lifecycle runs on 14 automated Braze Canvases with zero manual intervention.
600k+
loyalty contacts in 44 days (2,971% growth)
40.6%
signup-to-buyer conversion rate
+50%+
conversion uplift for loyalty users vs. guest users
~70%
of annual non-loyalty LTV achieved in month one alone
THE AMBITION
Last to the party. First in class.
KFC Spain had a saying internally: "When you are late to the party, you have to bring the champagne."
Competitors had loyalty programmes. KFC Spain didn't. But rather than rush out something generic, the team made a deliberate decision: if they were going to be last, they would be best. They wanted to redefine what loyalty looks like in QSR.
KFC Spain serves millions of customers a year across restaurants, drive-thrus, kiosks, app and web. They had a CRM platform in Braze, but no way to reward customers for coming back. The ambition was threefold: drive repeat purchase frequency, create a first-party data asset KFC owned outright, and give customers a reason to engage with the brand between meals. It had to feel like KFC - irreverent, gamified, distinctive - and work across every channel.
Alberto Ascorve, KFC Spain's CRM & Loyalty Specialist, knew the challenge was to build a programme that justified the wait.
Competitors had loyalty programmes. KFC Spain didn't. But rather than rush out something generic, the team made a deliberate decision: if they were going to be last, they would be best. They wanted to redefine what loyalty looks like in QSR.
KFC Spain serves millions of customers a year across restaurants, drive-thrus, kiosks, app and web. They had a CRM platform in Braze, but no way to reward customers for coming back. The ambition was threefold: drive repeat purchase frequency, create a first-party data asset KFC owned outright, and give customers a reason to engage with the brand between meals. It had to feel like KFC - irreverent, gamified, distinctive - and work across every channel.
Alberto Ascorve, KFC Spain's CRM & Loyalty Specialist, knew the challenge was to build a programme that justified the wait.
THE CHALLENGE
From absolute zero to total omnichannel
Building a loyalty programme from zero across every channel KFC operates - app, web, kiosk, drive-thru, in-restaurant - while integrating a third-party loyalty engine, designing gamification mechanics, and automating the entire lifecycle before a public launch date is a serious proposition.
No existing loyalty infrastructure
Every flow, tier, and reward mechanic had to be designed, built and tested from scratch.
Real-time integration
Talon.One needed to talk to Braze in real time - triggering reward distribution, tier calculations, and personalised offers the moment a customer qualified. Any lag would break the experience.
Omnichannel complexity
The programme needed to work identically whether a customer ordered via the app, walked into a restaurant, used a kiosk, or drove through. Rewards earned in one channel had to be redeemable in all others.
Speed
The team took over delivery in December 2025 and needed the full ecosystem live ahead of the public launch in June 2026. Six months from nothing to a fully automated loyalty lifecycle.
Scale without noise
With a pre-launch migration pool of 2 million eligible users, the comms architecture had to scale aggressively without sending duplicate, conflicting or poorly timed messages.
What started as a 'not yet' has become one of our most transformational launches. Building the KFC Spain loyalty program from the ground up has not only changed how we engage with our customers, but also how we drive growth, and this is just the beginning.
Alberto Ascorve, CRM & Loyalty Specialist, KFC España y Portugal
THE PROGRAMME: EL CLUB DE LA HUCHA
Loyalty, served with signature KFC irreverence.
KFC Spain didn't build a loyalty programme that looks like everyone else's.
They built one that sounds like KFC.
El Club de la Hucha (The Piggy Bank Club) is a gamified, four-tier loyalty programme where customers earn 10 points for every Euro spent and advance through levels named in KFC Spain's signature irreverent tone:
They built one that sounds like KFC.
El Club de la Hucha (The Piggy Bank Club) is a gamified, four-tier loyalty programme where customers earn 10 points for every Euro spent and advance through levels named in KFC Spain's signature irreverent tone:
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Every tier delivers a permanent discount across all orders in every channel - not one-off coupons, but always-on benefits that scale as customers progress. On top of that, every 200 points unlocks a "caja fuerte" (safe) containing personalised rewards. The visual experience is built around an interactive progression map, creating a genuine gamification loop rather than a transactional discount scheme.
The programme soft-relaunched on May 11 before going public on June 4, 2026 with a campaign led by PS21 and Arena Media. The CRM engine had been running for weeks already, quietly onboarding users and proving the mechanics worked before the spotlight hit.
THE BUILD
The CRM Engine:
Infrastructure & Orchestration
The lifecycle automation backbone runs on 14 purpose-built Braze Canvases under a unified
AUT_LOYALTY namespace, covering every stage of the customer journey:
1
Onboarding
L01 Welcome New: Multi-step welcome flow for first-time loyalty sign-ups
L02 Welcome Existing: Tailored flow for existing KFC customers migrating into the programme
L02 Welcome Existing: Tailored flow for existing KFC customers migrating into the programme
2
Gamification
L03 Box Unlocked: Triggered when a customer earns enough points to open a safe
L04 Reward Selected: Confirmation and guidance when a reward is chosen
L07-L09 Level Up: Celebration comms when a customer advances to the next tier
L12-L14 Level Proximity: Nudge messaging when a customer is close to levelling up - the "you're almost there" trigger that drives incremental purchases
L04 Reward Selected: Confirmation and guidance when a reward is chosen
L07-L09 Level Up: Celebration comms when a customer advances to the next tier
L12-L14 Level Proximity: Nudge messaging when a customer is close to levelling up - the "you're almost there" trigger that drives incremental purchases
3
Retention
L05 Reward Reminder 30D: First nudge when a coupon is 30 days from expiry
L06 Reward Reminder 7D: Urgency trigger at 7 days - driving redemption before lapse
L06 Reward Reminder 7D: Urgency trigger at 7 days - driving redemption before lapse
4
Profile Completion
L10-L11 Complete Profile: Chaser flows to capture additional user data, enriching segmentation for future personalisation
The architecture integrates Braze with Talon.One via Connected Content and webhooks for real-time reward distribution, tier management, and personalised offer delivery. Early Connected Content challenges were identified and resolved during hypercare to achieve zero errors in production.
Intelligent timing across Welcome, Box & Locked, and Reward Available paths uses smart delays that dynamically adjust channel cadence, completely eliminating communications overlap.
Intelligent timing across Welcome, Box & Locked, and Reward Available paths uses smart delays that dynamically adjust channel cadence, completely eliminating communications overlap.
Automated safety nets instantly exit users from migration or pre-launch streams the moment they register or join core loyalty segments, ensuring a clean experience even while parallel acquisition campaigns target 2 million eligible users.
The pre-launch migration stream was designed for controlled scaling: capped at 200,000 entries every Monday across 22 days and 4 weekly touchpoints, maintaining infrastructure stability while growing the base aggressively. It secured 50+ sign-ups within the first 30 minutes of going live.
The pre-launch migration stream was designed for controlled scaling: capped at 200,000 entries every Monday across 22 days and 4 weekly touchpoints, maintaining infrastructure stability while growing the base aggressively. It secured 50+ sign-ups within the first 30 minutes of going live.
THE RESULTS
The velocity of scale
El Club de la Hucha soft-relaunched on May 11, with the full public campaign following on June 4. In the first 44 days:
Hyper-Growth
- The target CRM segment grew by 2,971%.
- Average daily growth rate of ~2% week-over-week during a massive acceleration phase.
- A single-day surge on June 10 that expanded the contact segment by 5% in 24 hours.
- Growth is accelerating, not plateauing - on track to significantly beat the Loyalty OKR.
Conversion
- 40.6% signup-to-active-buyer conversion rate - not a vanity registration metric, but real commercial shift.
Audience & Reachability as of 23 Jun 2026
- ~50% of users are "Super Users" contactable via email or push.
- >13% contactable via both channels (dual-channel reach).
- >36% email opt-ins / >26% push opt-ins.
Commercial Impact
- +50%+ conversion uplift for loyalty users vs. guest users
- Positive low-single-digit AOV uplift vs. guest users, with loyalty members spending more per order
- Double-digit share of sales already linked to loyalty (low-teens % of total sales)
- Double-digit share of transactions already linked to loyalty (low-teens % of total transactions).
- Month-one loyalty LTV already represents ~70% of the annual non-loyalty benchmark. In one month, loyalty members are approaching what non-loyalty customers deliver in a full year
Operational
- All 14 automated lifecycle Canvases live and stable.
- Zero blockers, zero Connected Content errors in production.
- Intelligent timing eliminated all communications overlap.
Looking ahead
The lifecycle is automated and the growth trajectory is ahead of plan. But as Alberto put it: "the best part is that this is just the beginning."
The programme gives KFC Spain something it never had: a direct, opted-in, first-party relationship with hundreds of thousands of customers. That data asset - growing by nearly 15,000 users a day - unlocks everything that comes next.
Phase 2 is already underway:
The programme gives KFC Spain something it never had: a direct, opted-in, first-party relationship with hundreds of thousands of customers. That data asset - growing by nearly 15,000 users a day - unlocks everything that comes next.
Phase 2 is already underway:
- Kiosk as a native loyalty channel. Integrating the Braze SDK directly into on-site kiosks as a dedicated loyalty touchpoint, with exclusive on-screen offers, kiosk in-app messages, and gamified "easter eggs" to drive cross-channel adoption.
- Tier-based personalisation and VIP framework. Shifting from one-size-fits-all to a segmented architecture with bespoke offers tailored to specific loyalty tiers, plus a dedicated VIP framework to protect and maximise the lifetime value of top spenders.
The next phase is about proving the commercial flywheel: loyalty members spend more, visit more often, and stay longer. The infrastructure to measure it is already in place.
MASSIVE ROCKET
The team behind it
El Club de la Hucha was a cross-functional effort spanning multiple partners and agencies, with KFC Spain's CRM & Loyalty team at the centre.
Alberto Ascorve led the programme from the client side, coordinating across KFC Europe, KPS AG, and a partner ecosystem that included Massive Rocket (CRM & lifecycle automation), Talon.One (loyalty engine), Loyalty & Reward Co, PS21, Arena Media, NCR Voyix, ACRELEC, Cognizant, Esgasy Group Solutions, Not Found™, and Braze.
Alberto Ascorve led the programme from the client side, coordinating across KFC Europe, KPS AG, and a partner ecosystem that included Massive Rocket (CRM & lifecycle automation), Talon.One (loyalty engine), Loyalty & Reward Co, PS21, Arena Media, NCR Voyix, ACRELEC, Cognizant, Esgasy Group Solutions, Not Found™, and Braze.
In Alberto's words:
"It has been an enormous project in which many people have participated. I have been lucky to lead this project supported by an incredible team."
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