The Sun Newspaper launches a prepaid MasterCard

The headline that caught my attention this morning is the launch of a Prepaid MasterCard by the Sun.
For those who are unfamiliar with the UK newspaper, it is the most
widely circulated with over three million copies distributed to almost
eight million readers, most of whom are interested in headlines such as
“Freddie Starr ate my hamster” and the scantily clad females that adorn
it’s colourful pages.

The prepaid card deal is that you buy the
card for £6.49, and get £5 back when you top-up the first time with £10
or more.  It also has a line that you can use it wherever you see the
MasterCard sign, “that’s over £25million locations” … I think
they left the £ in by accident as they can see the £ signs illuminated
by offering this to their unbanked and mass audience.

In fact,
this is quite a bold and innovative move as I’ve been saying for a
while now that prepaid is a major untapped market opportunity which
will be worth over €80 billion by 2010, and the Sun is the first major non-bank I’ve seen targeting this opportunity.  So good for them.

Meanwhile, my last blog
on this area finished with the line “that prepaid cards appeal mainly
to young, single guys who want to download without giving away their
bank details.  Now what would I want to download anonymously as a
young, testosterone-charged male?”

I think the editor of the Sun must have read this as their audience fits this profile perfectly.