The Good: In our marketing efforts, we have developed a loyalty program that works wonders. We haven't lost a customer in 6 months.

The Bad: We're having trouble reaching our target market of Fraternity and Sorority members that are in college or have graduated.

The Ugly: When people come into contact with the offer, the think there is a catch when in actuality there is no catch. Hence, even when we reach people, they discard our offer.

I realize that the slogan "$1,000 for your Fraternity or Sorority" sounds like a gimmick, but i can't figure a better way to promote an offer where we give our loyal customers a refund of up to $1,000 at the end of a calendar for them being loyal. Advice, ideas, help would be much apppreciated.

Can you provide more detail on your promotion? What is the language that you are using?

Sounds like you might be in the rather awkward position of undervaluing your product, at least insofar as messaging is concerned. I.e. Lexus doesn't offer a money-back guarantee on their cars because it would cheapen their offer. You are experiencing a perverse form of that.

We are offering student organizations who use us for an entire semester of school a $1 rebate for each item ordered just for being loyal. It is a market driven mainly by price, but also a market where the organizations are short on cash. The idea is that they get something in return for trying a new company and for being loyal. Hopefully this won't be taken as self promotion, but our website states the following

"When placing your first order for the semester, you provide a list of events you plan to order screen printing or embroidery for. This list is not an obligation, but rather a check list for us to ensure loyalty throughout the semester.

You place orders throughout the semester as needed.

If at the end of the semester, all of your screen printing and embroidery has been ordered through Carousel of Stitches we will mail your chapter or philanthropy a check totaling $1 per piece ordered up to $500. Over the course of the school year, that is up to $1,000 for your organization. For example: if your chpater orders 4 orders of 100 t-shirts and your members buy 50 pieces of greek apparel from COS we will give you $450.00

You receive a check by June 15th for the spring semester and January 15th for fall semester."

The advertising tag line is "$1,000 for your fraternity or sorority" I'm biased because it was my creation, does that sound like it cheapens the product?

Thank you for your opinion. Let me know your opinion.

This strategy is quite innovative, but I feel some initial trepidation. After some thought, here are some drawbacks:
It suggests you're not providing the lowest possible price because there's money left over later if they buy enough. In other words, you're telling a price-sensitive market to wait to save money.
It requires customers to provide information that they might feel uncomfortable disclosing (events list) and that may be indeterminate.
IMO it feels like a "hard sell" for the other events, and that turns me off a little bit.
If customers aren't sure if they'll need more printing for those events, it voids the benefit. Even if they miss one, the perception is they've lost the loyalty reward opportunity.

You're not targeting a market that is looking for innovation so much as, as you point out, low first cost. Nor is it a market likely to engender loyalty, both because the product you provide is a commodity (from the customer's perspective) and college kids just don't think that way. Seems like the best way to create repeat business is to include with purchases a discount on future purchases made within the next x months (e.g. 6), or quantity discounts that include multiple designs so that they can preorder for multiple events (very unlikely, but might be worth a shot).

Best of luck.