A pioneer in the creation of online rebate fulfillment, Chris Quinlan is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Ohana Companies, LLC. Ohana Companies utilizes revolutionary, patented and patent-pending technology and processes to change the way consumers, retailers and manufacturers participate in rebates and loyalty marketing. The company’s motto is “Everybody Wins.”

“The name for our company was inspired by my three daughters, Abby, Molly & Julia, who were fans of the Disney movie ‘Lilo & Stitch,’ where a young Hawaiian girl tells her alien friend that nobody gets left behind. For me, that applies to my past experiences with the rebate industry. The consumer has always been left behind, the vendor or manufacturer doesn’t realize the danger inflicted on their brand, and the fulfillment companies take advantage. Ohana Companies changes the status quo and makes sure that no one – consumers, retailers and manufacturers – gets left behind. Everybody wins.”

The first to offer retailers and manufacturers a completely online solution to redeem, validate and fulfill rebates via exclusive agreements with PayPal and later Visa International, Quinlan was previously a co-founder of a Wilmington, Delaware technology company than focused on rebate and reward marketing solutions with clients that included Happy Harry’s, Weis Markets and Rite-Aid.

Quinlan’s considerable marketing and rebate industry expertise dates back to his youth. His father was a master broker for a number of consumer products in the 1960s and 1970s. After working for a consumer products broker in Massachusetts after college, Quinlan started his own consumer products brokerage firm in Wilmington, Delaware in 1990. He represented major food and drug brands and other clients that included 3M, Maybelline, Mattel, Hawaiian Tropic, Polaroid and Sylvania.

“The idea for Ohana Companies dates back to the late 1990s, when I literally sketched out an idea on a cocktail napkin,” Quinlan said. “There has to be a more efficient, consumer-friendly way to do rebates benefiting retailers and their manufacturers. There is also a need for transparency, for companies to have a clear picture of their customers, and for customers to have a clear picture of the benefits they can receive by doing business with those companies.”

That cocktail napkin sketch evolved into Quinlan’s first patent for the aggregation of multiple rebates on one check, and he has several related patents pending. An expert on the subject of rebates, Quinlan presented “The Future of Rebates” at a Federal Trade Commission workshop in San Francisco in April 2007, and recently was a presented for a workshop on “Mitigating Risks on Rebate and Prepaid Card Programs” at the PROMO Live Conference in Chicago. Quinlan has been widely quoted in major media outlets as well as in the Wikipedia entry on “Rebates.”