The trend of a declining donation rate raises questions about the unpaid nature of blood donations. Due to the COVID-19-pandemic, the practice of offering a snack after the donation as non-monetary compensation had to be changed. A blood drive goodie bag was introduced as alternative compensation. Our research aims to understand donor satisfaction with the goodie bag, evaluate the effectiveness of the new method and derive recommendations for future blood donor compensation.

In this study, we developed a multi-level model to test the research hypotheses on the attractiveness of the blood drive goodie bag and supplementary forms of compensation, the donor satisfaction and the future donation intention. The data was collected by surveying blood donors at local blood drives using self-administered questionnaires created by the online survey software Unipark. Of the 1.269 donors who could be reached, 1.008 donors took part in the survey (79.43%). Of these, 767 participants completed the questionnaire in full, which at 60.44% emphasises the high informative value of this comprehensive study. The study period ran from December 2023 to February 2024 and was analysed using both descriptive statistics and hypothesis tests to check statistical significance.

The results showed that the receipt of the blood drive goodie bag had no significant effect on the future intention of active donors to donate blood. Nevertheless, 75% of donors were satisfied with their current blood drive goodie bag. 71% of donors did not consider personalisation of the contents to be relevant. The option of a blood value analysis, which was requested by 86% of donors, is a promising impulse for the further development of compensation. Interestingly, the loyalty of donors grew with increasing satisfaction regarding the spatial and temporal accessibility of the blood drive, which in turn enhanced the likelihood of recommending the donation to third parties.

The study provides a comprehensive understanding of the underlying factors of donor satisfaction and loyalty based on the non-monetary compensation currently used. Knowledge of the effectiveness of the blood drive goodie bags enables those responsible in the blood donation system to take targeted measures to optimize the compensation of blood donors and thus strengthen donor loyalty and improve recommendation management by active blood donors.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.