I’ve never fully understood Barclaycard branding in the US. Barclaycard US is a subsidiary of Barclays, which is based in the UK. Here in the US, Barclaycard issues all kinds of popular credit cards, including co-brand credit cards from American Airlines, JetBlue, and Uber.
According to their website, it looks like Barclaycard US will be rebranding as Barclays in April. For example, here’s the message they have on some accounts:
Coming soon
Your new statement will arrive in April. Look for it in the mail soon.
We’re changing our name from Barclaycard to Barclays. Things will start to look a little different, but just keep doing what you are doing.
While the process of them changing their name seems like a pain to me (presumably over time they’ll be reissuing all of their cards), this change seems logical. I’m not sure why they ever decided on the Barclaycard name, for that matter:
- Barclays has significant brand recognition globally, so I don’t know why they wouldn’t capitalize on that
- The “card” at the end of the name was confusing — for example, is the card called the Barclaycard Arrival Plus Card, or just the Barclaycard Arrival Plus, since the first word already has “card” in it?
So this seems like a smart rebrand to me, and once and for all I won’t have to be confused about whether I should use the term “card” twice when referring to a card, or not.
What do you make of Barclaycard US’ rebranding?
(Tip of the hat to Doctor Of Credit)
Just to clarify....I work for this company and to date has been called the Barclaycard Arrival Plus MasterCard.
Maybe instead of spending who knows how much money to rebrand they could spend that money to actually provide a REAL CHIP & PIN card to us Americans the way they originally marketed their ARRIVALS+ card.
The fact that we are the last country in the world stuck with the insecurity of signatures (sorry but what clerk compares signatures?) over PINs is insanity... and while not Barclays fault per se, they falsely advertised that...
Maybe instead of spending who knows how much money to rebrand they could spend that money to actually provide a REAL CHIP & PIN card to us Americans the way they originally marketed their ARRIVALS+ card.
The fact that we are the last country in the world stuck with the insecurity of signatures (sorry but what clerk compares signatures?) over PINs is insanity... and while not Barclays fault per se, they falsely advertised that card and have never once done anything to make PIN use mandatory for those of us who wish it to be.
I love my AA Silver Barclaycard which I’ve had longer than just about any other card. I’ve had great service from them and I, too, love my 10,000 anniversary miles and other benefits. While other cards come and go, this one will be with me forever. They can call it whatever they like just so the benefits and good customer service remain intact.
meh. as long as they keep giving me 10,000 AA aaniversary miles every March I really couldn't care less
In the US it’s mostly just a marketing name/brand anyway, as the cards themselves are issued by Barclays Bank Delaware
Ben - the “Barclaycard” branding is something of a quirk of history. It was set up by Barclays in the mid 60s as a stand-alone payment method (alongside, at the time, Amex and Diners), so it was actually hoped/intended to become a card network, Although was ultimately overtaken by Visa and (in the U.K.) all “stand-alone” Barclaycards became Visa cards (although they now issue Mastercards, too). The brand had built up a significant reputation in...
Ben - the “Barclaycard” branding is something of a quirk of history. It was set up by Barclays in the mid 60s as a stand-alone payment method (alongside, at the time, Amex and Diners), so it was actually hoped/intended to become a card network, Although was ultimately overtaken by Visa and (in the U.K.) all “stand-alone” Barclaycards became Visa cards (although they now issue Mastercards, too). The brand had built up a significant reputation in the U.K., so Barclays retained it as a standalone credit-card issuing subsidiary. Even though Barclays remains one of the biggest U.K. retail banks, all Barclays-issued credit cards in the U.K. are issued by Barclaycard. It follows that the logical vehicle (from a Barclays perspective) to launch international (non U.K.) credit cards was Barclaycard, so that’s what they did. I suspect the internal difficulties of issuing a plain “Barclays” branded credit card meant that it was not historically attractive. (I say all of this as a former Barclaycard employee).
They called it Barclaycard because that’s the name that was given to Barclays credit cards in the U.K. in the 60s...and is still used as that now there too. Barclaycard was the first credit in the U.K.