LoyaltyOne Completes Integration of AIR MILES for Social Change and Announces Departure of the Social Program's Original Founder

TORONTO, Oct. 23, 2012 /CNW/ - LoyaltyOne, Inc. today announced that it has executed all elements of its purchase agreement of Green Rewards, which was originally acquired in 2008 and was then re-named and launched as AIR MILES for Social Change. The successful and rapidly growing entrepreneurial social venture has now been fully integrated into LoyaltyOne's AIR MILES Reward Program and consequently Green Rewards original founder and President, Andreas Souvaliotis, is leaving the business.

"Mission accomplished", said Souvaliotis.  "In just a few short years we built one of the most effective, broad-reaching and celebrated national social ventures in Canada by relying on the immense power and relevance of this country's most popular loyalty rewards program.  We helped create some truly revolutionary initiatives among many government agencies from coast to coast and together we discovered better, more effective and far more efficient ways to trigger behaviour change on a mass scale.  Our Canadian success story now serves as a model for the rest of the world."

"The accomplishments of the social venture that Andreas founded some years ago are best measured through the direct impact on the lives of our fellow citizens from coast to coast" said Bryan Pearson, President and CEO of LoyaltyOne, Inc.  "We are helping Canadians find and make healthier and greener everyday lifestyle choices - and, along the way, we are also generating very significant cost savings for our mission partners and government clients.  We are all grateful for Andreas' visionary leadership through the formative years of this social venture and we are committed to maintaining the authenticity, mission and passionate culture that fuelled the success of AIR MILES for Social Change."

With a roster of over 25 prominent public and private sector as well as NGO partners, AIR MILES for Social Change leverages the value of AIR MILES reward miles and the program's reach into more than 10 million Canadian households to reward and inspire healthier and more environmentally sustainable everyday lifestyle choice.

About LoyaltyOne™

LoyaltyOne is a global leader in the design and implementation of coalition loyalty programs, customer analytics and loyalty services for Fortune 1000 clients around the world. LoyaltyOne's unparalleled track record delivering sustained business performance improvement for clients stems from its unique combination of hands-on practitioner experience and continuous thought leadership. LoyaltyOne has over 20 years history leveraging data-driven insights to develop and operate some of the world's most effective loyalty programs and customer-centric solutions. These include the AIR MILES Reward Program, North America's premier coalition loyalty program and a working partnership with Latin America's leading coalition program, dotz. LoyaltyOne is also the equity partner of Direxions, a loyalty pioneer headquartered in India and the owner of COLLOQUY, a group dedicated to research, publishing and education for the global loyalty industry. For more information, visit www.loyalty.com.

SOURCE: LoyaltyOne

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