Currito, a Cincinnati-based burrito chain, this past week announced it has made its digital rewards program available on Android phones' native digital wallet app, Google Wallet. The chain has already enabled iPhone users to save their digital loyalty and payment cards on the iPhone's digital wallet app, Passbook, according to a press release. 

Currito's presence in Google Wallet comes just one month after Google announced plans to pre-install Google Wallet on all Android phones.

"We have seen great results with our mobile loyalty program," said John Lanni, co-founder and COO of Currito. "In contrast to all other mobile loyalty programs, our program is app-free and our customers just have to download the card and save it on their digital wallet apps, iPhone Passbook or Google Wallet. This makes it easier for them to subscribe to the program and stay in it.

"Customers like the fact that we have a mobile solution that does not require an application download. We are not competing with million of other apps out there. We just want to be in users' digital wallets and build better relationships with our customers."

Currito uses a mobile loyalty, payment, couponing, gift card, and data analysis platform provided by Virtual Next, according to the announcement. The platform does not require the restaurant chain to launch its own application.

“We looked at a lot of restaurant apps out there and realized that with the exception of Starbucks, all are struggling because they don't have Starbucks' frequency of visits,” said Bijan Shahrokhi, CEO of Virtual Next. "If a restaurant's customers are not visiting them multiple times per week, they will not download their app. If they do, over 80 percent of them delete it in a month. With app-free digital cards, over 95 percent of the users stay in the program one year after joining it. Digital cards also cost less than apps and are more flexible since their content can be changed at any time without programming or coding."

Google is currently only opening the Google Wallet platform to selected third-party developers. Virtual Next and Currito were selected as one of the first companies to appear on Google Wallet, according to the announcement.