COS BREWS COMMUNITY PLATFORM AND SERVICES

COS Brews, and COSBrews.com, is a hyper-localized, community loyalty and exploration platform built and designed exclusively for the Colorado Springs’ craft beer community that provides the SERVICE. COS Brews caters its member experiences into four customer options:

Guests – Find location on COS map | View Breweries + Active Food Trucks | that is it  

Free accounts – Basic community notifications (email only) | access to all search/filter beer and food lists | access basic promos and games | points limited to 2,500

Local’s Club members – Advanced community notifications features (email and/or sms) | access to exclusive promos and games | unlimited points

Tourist Pass users – Two week pass | Double points on promo redemptions | exclusive promos and games | unlimited points | on expiration up to 2,500 points transferrable to Local’s Club members (COS friend, family, etc.) on request. 

With Business Accounts available for:

Breweries – Post beers, events, promos | participate in games that drive traffic | schedule with food trucks | notify engaged customers with personalized, user-selected updates

Food Trucks – Post food items | schedule with breweries | show activity statuses | auto-notify COS Brews customers who are opted in for notifications.

Users with accounts are encouraged to participate in various games as outlined in the GAME FORMATS below.

GAME FORMATS

COS Brews incorporates a variety of game types that are designed to get people up and exploring the Colorado Springs craft beer community.

Map Quests – Users must check-in (aka “redeem a promo”) at various breweries around town. The larger the area covered, the more points they earn. Breweries should see a lot of new faces coming in playing these games.

Treasure Hunts – these are a little more oriented for tourists, but locals can enjoy them as well. Essentially COS Brews curates a list of “things to do around our breweries”, working with local restaurants, community happenings, landmarks, and other organizations to create “treasure hunts” that users follow (scanning QR codes and answering questions along the way) to earn points and explore COS.

Earn Ranks – these are points that are earned by high frequency engagement. Very similar to “achievements” in console gaming, ranks are earned by completing various milestones and conditional objectives. For example “after 15 check-ins a user earns 500 points along with their ‘Amateur Craft Goer’ rank”.

Trivia and Surveys – These are designed to be fun and fast for customers to earn some quick points, while providing the COS community with invaluable new data and information opportunities that informed, actionable decisions can be made from. “What’s your favorite brewery event?”, for example.

Quick Points – These are points that can be earned by writing reviews (that are approved), sharing various COS Brews listings on social media, referring friends to join the platform, and other conceptually “quick” ways to earn points. 

VERIFIED BREWERIES

Being “verified” means that a brewery has successfully claimed a local COS brewery AND additionally agreed to actively participate in COS Brews games by offering “community promos and rewards” (according to these associated COS Brews Brewery Rules and Guidelines).

STANDARDIZED POINTS & PROMOS

Community promos and rewards are a standardized list of promos, each with their respective discount amount and (+/-) points value. To become “verified”, each brewery must select and offer an assortment of these “standard” promos and rewards according to the minimum and maximum quantity limits for each available category. Once their promo selections are approved, the promos will be added on the platform, and the brewery will be officially marked with the blue “verified badge” in the COSBrews.com platform.

STANDARDIZED PROMOS

MANDATORY – Unlimited Use / No Discount

Earn – 275 Points – Brewery Check-In

REQUIRED – Pick 2-5 “One Time Use” PROMOS

Earn – 200 Points – BOGO Pints

Earn – 220 Points – $4 Off Growlers

Earn – 250 Points – $5 Off $25

Earn – 280 Points – $2 Off Pint

Earn – 310 Points – $2 Off Crowler

Earn – 350 Points – $2 Off Flight

Earn – 450 Points – Join Mug Club

REQUIRED – Pick 2-5 “Unlimited Use” REWARDS – DISCOUNTS

Redeem – 1,050 Points – $2 Off Pint

Redeem – 2,500 Points – BOGO Pint

Redeem – 3,250 Points – ½ Off Pint

Redeem – 4,050 Points – Happy Hour Anytime

Redeem – 4,5000 Points – ½ Off Flight

Redeem – 5,700 Points – ½ Off Crowler

Redeem – 7,000 Points – ½ Off Growler

Redeem – 7,500 Points – BOGO Growler

REQUIRED – Pick 1-4 “Unlimited Use” REWARDS – FREEBIES

Redeem – 7,750 Points – Free Pint

Redeem – 11,500 Points – Free Glass/Mug

Redeem – 15,500 Points – Free Crowler

Redeem – 22,500 Points – Free T-Shirt

OPTIONAL – Max 3 – “Club and Pass Exclusives”

Earn – 225 Points – ½ Off Flights (ONE TIME USE)

Earn – 300 Points – $3 Off Flights (ONE TIME USE)

Redeem – 4,150 Points – 3 Pints for $15

Redeem – 8,500 Points – Free Flight

REDEEMING PROMOS

To ensure “data tangibility” (similar to keeping/logging physical, printed promos) a “live cross-check” is performed between an individual brewery staff member and customer (using their respective device), at the time of purchase, in real-time.

To begin the process a COS Brews customer will find an available promo to use at a participating verified brewery, come in, order, and request a “promo redemption” from their device. They are instructed at the time of the request to notify a staff attendant. Any staff members who have been “activated” for that day by a manager, can access their device and view that brewery’s “live promo feed”. They can quickly search for and find the customer’s promo request in the feed, it will display relevant information on the customer’s name, requested promo, COS Brews membership status (free, locals’ club, or tourist pass), and more.

Once the customer’s promo request has been found in the “live promo feed”, the staff member can either approve or deny the request. It is very important to incorporate this “human touch” to the approval/denial process so that appropriate conditions, common sense, and intuition can be afforded the promo redemption process.

IF DENIED – the promo will leave the list and the customer’s promo state will reset back.

IF APPROVED – the staff member can (and should) add a corresponding “POS order number” to the promo’s approval. Once approved the customer’s promo status will either show “no longer available” if it was a one-time-use promo, or reset back to normal in the case of an “unlimited-use promo”. The customer will additionally receive their points and unlock any relevant game objectives automatically.

There are five very important data points logged for every promo approval that occurs through the platform:

1. The customer’s ID (i.e. 01234)
2. The staff member’s first name and last initial (i.e. John D.)
3. The brewery’s COS Brews ID (i.e. GPB)
4. The promo that was redeemed (i.e. BOGO Pint)
5. The associated “POS Order Number” (i.e. 49403)

The combination of these data points for each logged transaction provides us a powerful database that we use to monitor for abuse and identify patterns and trends to share with participating breweries in attempts to improve the platform (according to our Terms and Conditions). 

We have worked strenuously to ensure this process is both seamless and secure for all participating parties. 

Please let us know if you have any questions or concerns regarding our promo redemption system. We are always looking to improve your experience using our platform.

Brewery-Specific Conditions

Brewery’s may imply conditions that do not interfere with the “communicated nature of the promo” . For example, it is completely within reason for a brewery to inform its staff to only redeem BOGO pints for its “flagship” beers, excluding its availability for limited releases, seasonals, etc. 95% of customers would understand and respect this condition, and COS Brews would as well.

That said COS Brews offers custom promo opportunities if a greater level of conditionality is required (day specific promos, event specific promos, etc). COS Brews will work with each brewery to help ensure everything is then implemented and communicated correctly per your unique conditions and value proposition. 

 

 

Custom Promos

Custom Promos can be requested in the brewery admin portal. There is an additional charge for custom, brewery-specific promos, however, new “standard” promos will be added according to the brewery community’s demand and frequency.

New promos must be approved before they are added, as they must meet various criteria in both their relation to and deviation from COS Brew’s existing Standard Promos.

 

HONORING REWARDS

In the case of reward requests, COS Brews, employs a “pay for your own success and promotion” concept and requires individual breweries fulfill and cover any and all expenses related to community reward requests made to them directly. 

The most important community guideline to understand in this regard is that COS Brews cannot and will not guarantee any manner or capacity of a user’s “brewery-specific” value be attributed to their “reward eligibility” for that brewery. This means that whether a customer is redeeming 15,000 points for a free crowler with points earned exclusively at one brewery, or this is their first time in – each verified brewery will respect the customer’s COS Brews community reward request, and provide the free crowler.

The rationale here is that requiring users to be aware of “brewery specific engagement conditions” before redemption is simply counterintuitive to the mission of making the Colorado Springs craft beer community fun, holistic, and welcoming.

ABUSE PREVENTION & POLICIES

Abuse is defined as “any action or intention by a participating party to render COS Brew’s services in a way that is malicious, discriminatory, or otherwise derogatory to the platform’s operation and/or provision of value to its members”.

COS Brews actively monitors and prevents abuse by customers, brewery staff, breweries, and affiliates.

Customers are actively monitored and redemption logs reviewed. If we see spikes in leaderboard activity or otherwise “out of the ordinary” behavior, we will review and handle any offending customer as we feel appropriate.

Brewery Staff are only allowed to approve/deny promos on days their brewery manager has toggled them as “on and working”. Each staff member can be manually revoked through the course of the day, and will automatically be revoked at the end of each day. Additionally, their first name/last name initial (i.e. John D.) is logged in every order their account redeems, which is additionally monitored.

Staff Managers logs are monitored for any odd trends or behaviors in daily staff activations. Additionally, COS Brews representatives will physically go to breweries and anonymously report on various factors as it relates to implementations of the COS Brews service.

Breweries are regulated according to COS Brews guidelines and “fair play” policies, that actively prevent breweries with high cash flow/margins, resource availability, or other form of “unique opportunity” from overwhelming the COS Brews platform in quantity or quality against the vast majority. Additionally, COS Brews reserves the right to suspend, cancel, or otherwise reduce any brewery’s placement and opportunity within the COS Brews platform that is deemed in direct infringement to these standards and guidelines and/or is brought to attention by COS Brews’ customers in any facet.

User Reporting is additionally available on all listings via the “Report Listing” button. Any Promo, Brewery, Food Truck, Event, Game, or Beer can be individually reported for abuse. Users may additionally go to the COS Brews Support Page and fill out the form or send an email to [email protected]. 

All reported instances will be reviewed by COS Brews staff and handled as COS Brews feels is appropriate with any and all necessary parties committing abuse.

ACCESS TO SUPPORT

To accomplish a high-value and mission-forward relationship with each participating brewery, COS Brews provides and maintains a local support representative, available on a daily basis, who can provide on-site, face-to-face support opportunities on request (currently Matt Blanchette for Colorado Springs area) to breweries and food trucks. Your COS Brews support representative also fields support topics raised by customers and serving as a mediator between brewery interests and customer requests in Colorado Springs through the COS Brews platform.

All that said, COS Brews intends to engage with your brewery at the level you would like to engage. While we will definitely reach out on a semi-frequent basis to check in if we haven’t heard from you, COS Brews offers various marketing and content opportunities that we will actively communicate to our participating breweries. We fully expect to engage at an individual level with each participating brewery at least a few times throughout the year in regards to these mutual initiatives and opportunities. Otherwise, support will be available via phone, email, support portal (coming soon), or in-person on request.