Kura Sushi has scrapped its flat, points-only loyalty program and replaced it with a three-tier membership structure inside its Kura Sushi Rewards mobile app, the company announced in October 2026.

The chain also killed its 300-bonus-point welcome offer for new signups and substituted an instant free soft drink reward instead. The moves arrive as the company works to rebuild restaurant-level operating margins toward its historical 20%.

What does the new program pay out?

Across all three tiers, members can redeem 500 points for a $5 reward or a free side, or 1,000 points for free select noodles. Customers earn points on dine-in purchases and on orders placed through the app or online. Earning rates run from 10 to 12 points per dollar, depending on tier, according to the chain's website.

The old program was simpler and less flexible. Customers earned a flat 10 points for every $1 spent, in-store or online, and automatically received a $5 reward at 500 points plus a free birthday dessert, according to an archived version of the rewards site captured in July 2026.

Why is Kura re-engineering rewards now?

The economics are straightforward. Loyalty members are growing their average checks faster than non-members, executives said during Kura Sushi's July earnings call covering the fiscal third quarter. A tiered structure that rewards higher spend with faster point accrual is designed to push more of that behavior — more traffic and higher checks from the chain's most engaged customers.

"We reshaped our rewards program with the main intention of putting the power of choice in our guests' hands," said Charlie Nguyen, digital marketing and strategy manager at Kura Sushi USA. "By introducing dynamic, competitive tiers and giving members total flexibility over their points, we're delivering real value based directly on what our superfans told us they wanted."

The program changes also carry a cost-containment logic. Replacing an automatic $5 reward with menu-item redemptions — a soft drink, a side, select noodles — shifts the reward liability toward lower-cost items the chain sources at scale, rather than a blanket discount applied to any check.

Can loyalty mechanics offset tariff pressure?

Kura Sushi has taken significant cost hits from tariffs. In the fiscal third quarter, cost of goods sold as a percentage of sales ran 200 basis points higher than the prior year, President and CEO Hajime Uba said in an earnings release. Operational discipline offset much of that impact and improved restaurant-level margins by 90 basis points year over year, he added.

That leaves a gap the chain still needs to close to reach its historical 20% restaurant-level operating margin. Higher member frequency and check growth — the two levers a tiered loyalty program directly targets — represent one of the few demand-side tools available that does not require menu price increases during a cost squeeze.

The tiered approach also gives Kura a segmentation instrument. A top tier, marketed with what the company calls "Elite Tuna Tier perks," creates an aspirational rung for heavy users, while the instant drink reward lowers the friction of joining for first-time guests who previously had to accumulate 300 points before seeing any value.

How broad is the tiering trend?

Kura Sushi joins a growing list of chains that have restructured points-based programs around tiers and flexible redemptions:

• Charleys updated its rewards program alongside a menu expansion
• Panera Bread relaunched MyPanera on a points-based framework
• Tropical Smoothie Cafe added gamification and personalization elements to its points program

The common thread across these redesigns is flexibility: replacing fixed, automatic rewards with menus of redemption options and status levels. For operators, flexible redemption menus give the brand control over reward cost per redemption; for guests, choice replaces the one-size-fits-all payout.

Kura Sushi's bet is that this trade — more program complexity in exchange for higher member spend and cheaper redemptions — will help close the margin gap that tariffs opened. Watch the next two quarters of member check data to see whether the tiers deliver.