As one of the oldest and best-known fashion brands globally, you might not think Levi’s would have to do much to engender loyalty, but the company works hard to keep customers engaged and has just unveiled its loyalty programme in four new countries.

The programme currently has 38 million members globally and that number should receive a boost as it rolls out to Ireland, Denmark and Poland with Switzerland set to join the group in June.

The Red Tab member programme is part of the American denim giant’s aim of accelerating its DTC-first strategy in Europe. And it’s having an impact, with members being among the most valuable and engaged of its customers. That means the Red Tab extension has the potential to dynamically drive the bottom line sales-wise far beyond the mere number of regular customers the brand has in the programme’s new countries.

The company said this “is a key step in Levi’s commitment to delivering a seamless, omnichannel shopping experience that helps build fans for life” in one of its key market regions.

As mentioned, Red Tab, which was first unveiled in 2020, is currently getting close to 40 million consumers signed up. In Europe, it’s currently available in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, and the Czech Republic, with the new additions bringing it to 12 European countries in total.

Leona De Graft, VP of E-Commerce at Levi Strauss & Co Europe, said the expansion “is a key enabler of our DTC-first and omnichannel evolution. By integrating digital and in-store experiences, the programme strengthens our ability to deliver a connected, convenient, and rewarding shopping journey across all touchpoints. But we are not just driving loyalty—we are building lifelong Levi’s fans through unique benefits such as our in-store tailoring service to both customise and repair denim garments. With Red Tab, our members truly Live in Levi’s”. 

The programme is “designed to make Levi’s fans’ journey with the brand more seamless, more enjoyable and lifelong”. Members get premium benefits with an extended product guarantee and lifetime access to tailoring services, including repairs. 

Central to it are coins, earned on every purchase, redeemable for vouchers to shop online or in-store. Additional perks include free shipping, birthday surprises and early access to exclusive collabs. Member Days also give fans access to concert tickets, curated trips and events across Europe. The European-wide nature of the programme mean members retain their benefits in all the countries where it’s available.

And in an omnichannel retail world, Red Tab is also “the biggest connecter between the store and digital environment”.

The inside view

FashionNetwork.com asked Leona De Graft to give us some more insight into what the company and its consumers get out of Red Tab.

FNW: Can you explain what you do and what the programme is all about?

LDG: “I have the joy of leading our loyalty proposition for Europe. In January 2024 we announced our growth plan which is focused on us growing into a $10 billion business by 2027. Our DTC channels continue to outpace our growth across Europe but key to this strategy is loyalty. It’s firmly at the heart of everything we want to do. There’s lots of things it drives for us but I’d start by saying the fact that we can connect to our consumers directly is really, really important. We gain more consumer insights and it means we can be even sharper with the way we communicate with them. 

“It also means we can personalise the shopping experience. We can provide really tailored recommendations beyond just denim bottoms. It really aligns with our strategy, making sure that we pivot to new categories and build our portfolio outside of just jeans.”

FNW: How important is Red Tab to Levi’s and how important is Europe within it?

LDG: “The loyalty programme is a lot for us outside of just driving retention rates. We have over 38 million members and Europe is around a third, just with the markets that we have live now. We’ll be expanding that hopefully in the future as well. We continue to see really strong growth in our member acquisition numbers [and] we see more engagement from our consumers when they’re part of the Red Tab loyalty programme. [We see] how frequently they’re engaging in shopping our brand and we see much stronger customer active rates for our red tab consumers. 

“They’re actually worth more from a value point of view. And they also drive over 50% of our DTC revenue.”

FNW: Can you tell us about the benefits and how the programme is developing. 

LDG: “With any loyalty programme the great thing is that we get lots of insights and data. This won’t necessarily be the loyalty programme that we keep in the long run [as] we’re constantly iterating and improving [it]. We want to accelerate as quickly as possible so as quickly as we can move and expand [it] while also making sure that consumers feel it’s beneficial for them, we’ll do that. Making sure that it’s the right programme is important for us. 

“There are lots of great benefits. We have a good mixture between transactional, emotional and experiential. Core to our programme are coins. We also offer free shipping free returns, the standard transaction benefits. But what’s exciting are the differentiators. A key differentiator for us is actually our tailor shops and you have a tailor shop benefit as a Red Tab member where you can access repairs and also reimagine your Levi’s product. You can crop your jeans, have them hemmed, add some patches — you can really express yourself. And Red Tab members also get an extended product guarantee — for life. We stand by the fact that our product is quality, it’s durable. The experiential benefits are really strong too, music for instant is a core part of our marketing strategy and our DNA as a brand and we want to make sure we can unlock some of that experience for our members. 

“We have competitions, loyalty pop-ups at the best music events across Europe. A recent example is All Points East in the UK where we had a tailor shop pop-up. 

FNW: You’re based in London, do you oversee the entire loyalty programme across Europe?

LDG: I’m in London and I handle all of Europe [but] I have a team that stretches across six countries. Where we have specialist needs or we have countries where we want to make sure that we’re growing we have loyalty managers based in those countries as well. We want to make sure that the programme is tailored to each country as well as to each person and we want to make sure that it’s localised. 

FNW: Where do the stores fit in?

LDG: [Red Tab] also means that we’re closer to our stores. Retail is a key ‘unlock’ to our loyalty programme acquisition. You get an amazing experience when you visit one of our stylists in-store. I think it’s important that my team is on the road going out to our stores to find out how the sign-up rate is going, [how] our loyalty benefit consumers [are] coming in asking for new stuff. We can take this feedback and improve the programme. One thing to call out is that you can use the loyalty programme across the whole of Europe. If you’re in London, if you go to Paris you can go into one of our tailor shops and get [your Levi’s] tailored or hemmed. You can use your loyalty coins across the whole of Europe. It’s a pan-European programme for us.

FNW: How many tailor shops do you have in Europe and do they have a big impact on customer loyalty?

LDG: Over 70. We measure the redemption rate of our benefits. It continues to grow year on year. Tailor shop is constantly called out in our CSAT [customer satisfaction] surveys as something that they love. It relates back to the quality of the product. The other thing is that it’s about us listening to what consumers want rather than us ‘inflicting’ benefits on them!”