Mapfre SA plans to use gift cards sold at retail stores, gas stations, newsstands and vending machines as a way to entice Brazilians to buy insurance.

Spain’s largest insurer, which sells auto, homeowner and life insurance policies, among other related products, disclosed it will team on the project with insurance operations from the government-run Banco do Brazil. Both parties already sell insurance jointly in the Brazilian market under the name Grupo Segurador Banco Do Brazil E Mapfre (Grupo BB E Mapfre). Mapfre said they are one of they are one of the leading insurance sellers in Brazil.

Plans call for selling a line of insurance products on gift cards, which will be packaged similar to how DVDs are sold. Customers can buy the insurance by choosing a box, after which they would pay for it at the store cash register or directly through the vending machine. While a variety of options are planned longer-term, the initial package will target residential insurance and include fire, lightening, plane crash and explosion coverage at various affordable price points.

At home, customers must activate the insurance at the website www.familiasempreprotegida.com.br, by way of an activation number found either on the package they just purchased or a receipt issued by the vending machine. Within 24 hours of activation, their coverage is in force.

Gilberto Lourenço, general manager for Marketing at Grupo BB E Mapfre, said in a statement that the project is designed to give consumers a radical, and easier way through which they can buy the insurance they need.

“More and more companies are including coverage in their products in order to make themselves more competitive, but no one has innovated in the way of delivering insurance to the consumer,” he said. “Someone needed to take this step, to ‘shake up’ the conventional sales structure.”

The idea, ultimately, is to bring consumers closer to the insurance market and attract millions of new customers, regardless of their class, who don’t yet have coverage, Marcos Ferreira, president of BB E Mapfre’s automotive, general and affinity insurance, said in a statement.

There is a real need in Brazil, which is a vast emerging market.

According to Datafolha Research Institute statistics cited by Maprfe, 95 percent of all Brazilian residents don’t have insurance, and 58 percent of all automobiles in the state lack coverage. A significant 88 percent of all Brazilians also are without life insurance, according to the data.

Source: Grupo BB E Mapfre