#ThrowbackThursday: The Long Road to the Veterans Online Shopping Benefit
On Veterans Day, the Exchange will mark the fifth anniversary of the Veterans online shopping benefit. More than 600,000 Veterans have used their lifelong online shopping benefit since it launched on Veterans Day 2017, placing nearly 1.5 million orders and saving nearly $24 million in sales tax.
But the Nov. 11, 2017, launch was the culmination of a long journey.
The first step to recognizing the service of all Veterans through a lifelong military resale benefit began, fittingly, with an Army Veteran, Exchange Director/CEO Tom Shull. In May 2014, Shull shared a proposal to extend online military exchange shopping benefits to all honorably discharged Veterans with Pentagon leadership. At the time, online exchange access was largely limited to active-duty service members and their dependents, retirees with at least 20 years of service and 100% disabled Veterans.
Associates march in Dallas’ Veterans Day Parade in 2017, the year the Veterans online shopping benefit launched.
Expanded eligibility required a change in Department of Defense policy. Shull began gathering support for the change. Several military and Veteran support organizations were quick to publicly announce support the effort.
An update to DoD policy was approved in January 2017. At the Exchange, work intensified to launch the benefit on Nov. 11, 2017.
On April 25, 2017, the VetVerify.org contact center soft-launched to begin authenticating 18 million newly-eligible Veterans.
The Information Technology directorate made changes to ShopMyExchange.com to ensure the website could handle significant traffic increases. Merchandising and e-Commerce associates worked to update the Exchange’s assortment to meet the needs of Veteran shoppers. Logistics reinvented the Exchange’s three distribution centers to operate as fulfillment centers.
These actions just scratch the surface of the work done to welcome all Veterans home to their hard-earned Exchange benefit: Click here for a detailed account of the work done to prepare for launch of the Veterans Online Shopping Benefit.
Exchange associates worked tirelessly to get word of the new benefit out to all Veterans through press releases; newspaper, television and radio interviews; social media posts; magazine and newspaper ads; events; and videos.
Shull spoke with Comcast Newsmakers and the Associated Press about the Exchange mission and the new benefit. The Exchange’s corporate communication team coordinated coverage by media outlets across the country, especially in areas with high concentrations of Veterans. Military.com and newspapers such as the Denver Post, the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Fort Worth Star-Telegram wrote about the benefit in advance of its launch.
Actor Mark Wahlberg during a visit to Exchange headquarters in 2017. Wahlberg, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood recorded videos promoting the Veterans online shopping benefit before it launched.
In the months leading up to the launch, celebrities such as Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood and others recorded endorsement videos informing Veterans of their new lifelong benefit.
The hard work paid off: When the benefit launched on Veterans Day 2017, online sales more than doubled the amount as the same period in 2016, reaching nearly $14 million, 120% above prior year.
