[April 05, 2012]

Wrapp Social Gifting Coming to France

Wrapp, the first social gifting app that lets you give your Facebook (News - Alert) friends free gift cards to top national and regional retailers, is coming to France.

Wrapp makes it fun and easy to give, receive and redeem gift cards using mobile devices or the Web, and allows Facebook friends to contribute to the presents.

For merchants, Wrapp is a proven, discount-free customer acquisition and retention platform for conducting performance-based campaigns. With Wrapp, retailers use friend-to-friend marketing to drive highly targeted in-store and on-line sales, and have real-time access to aggregated campaign and customer demographic data.

"France's top retailers understand that all social gifting services are not created equal - that interests must be 100 percent aligned when you share confidential customer data," said Wrapp's CEO Hjalmar Winbladh, who has been meeting merchants in France with Wrapp's chairman Fabian Mansson - the former CEO of global retailer H&M and U.S. apparel icon Eddie Bauer. "Since we don't own ecommerce businesses and promise to never start one, we can insure French retailers a long and lasting relationship built on innovation and real value creation."

Since mid-November when Wrapp began service in Sweden, some 150,000 consumers have sent more than 1.2 million gift cards that can be redeemed in stores operated by over 50 major retailers.

Every gift card given that is posted on the recipient's Facebook timeline or wall is seen by approximately 80 percent of their friends. Participating merchants report that sales average at least four to six times the face value of a free gift card offered on Wrapp.

"We have a totally different approach and business model from the clones and copycats that have suddenly sprung up since Wrapp introdued its unique brand of friend-to-friend marketing," said Winbladh. "We are well funded by our board members Niklas Zennström, co-founder of Skype (News - Alert), and Reid Hoffman, co-founder of the social network LinkedIn, and we are making significant investment here to insure success for French retailers."

Wrapp was started last year by Winbladh and a small team of entrepreneurs in Sweden, including Andreas Ehn, Spotify's (News - Alert) first chief technology officer; Magnus Hult, who played a key role in building Spotify's original technology and platform; Aage Reerslev, founder of mobile browser maker Squace; Leo Giertz, founder of Barefoot Hackers, one of Sweden's most acclaimed iPhone development shops; Fabian Mansson, former CEO of H&M and Eddie Bauer, who now serves as Wrapp's chairman; and Carl Fritjofsson, strategy advisor to Groupon.se. Winbladh co-founded Sendit, the first mobile Internet company, where he served as CEO, and took it public in 1997, before being acquired by Microsoft. In 2006 Winbladh co-founded Rebtel (News - Alert), now the world's largest independent mobile VoIP company.

How Wrapp Works

To get started, download the Wrapp mobile app from Apple's (News - Alert) App Store or Android Market, or use the web app at www.wrapp.com, and connect the Wrapp app to your Facebook account.

Wrapp will immediately start alerting you about friends' birthdays, and all you have to do to celebrate is choose a free or paid gift card offered by one of your friend's favorite brands. The gift you give appears on your friend's Facebook wall, so all of their friends can add to the present if they want.

To collect a gift card you click on the link sent to you in email, text message (SMS) or on your Facebook wall and automatically download the Wrapp app. When you're ready to use a gift card, you select the Wallet tab in the app, and the gift card you want to redeem. Then, press the Redeem button, and present the gift card and its barcode displayed on the phone's screen to the cashier, who will scan the barcode and complete the transaction.

"One of the things people like best about Wrapp is the gift cards you get are stored in your phone, so they're always right there in your pocket when you're ready to pick out something you really like," said Winbladh. "And because we work with Facebook, Wrapp users anywhere in the world can give gifts of real value to their friends and family living in France."

About Wrapp

Wrapp is a social gifting service for celebrating friends' occasions with free and paid gifts from attractive brands. Wrapp allows friends to contribute to gifts, and makes it fun and easy to give, receive and redeem using mobile devices and the web. Founded in the first half of 2011 by a group of serial entrepreneurs, Wrapp is based in Stockholm, with offices in the U.K., U.S., Germany and France. Celebrate with friends every day at www.wrapp.com.

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