ROLL UP THE RIM

Well, it’s the middle of February and that means “ROLL UP THE RIM” time in Canada. Every year Tim Horton’s will give away free cars, BBQ’s, bikes, coffee for a year and free coffees and donuts. All you have to do is to buy a coffee and when you are done you roll up the rim and see if there is a prize written there.

 

More often than not, it will say PLEASE PLAY AGAIN, but sometimes you will get lucky and find “Donut” or “Coffee” written there. That’s what happened to me today, I won a donut. I don’t need a donut and more than likely, I shouldn’t be eating donuts, but free is as they say, free.

 

This year, because it is the 50^th anniversary of Tim Horton’s, each cup gives you two chances to win or in my wife’s case, two invitations to “PLEASE PLAY AGAIN”. You can tell it is a Canadian company because we are polite even when you lose. I imagine that in other countries you would get a message like “LOSER” or “HA-HA SUCKER”. Well, actually in most countries they wouldn’t even offer free anything. It is a wonderful marketing strategy that they have come up with. You want to have a coffee and you might just as well get it from the company that may give you a prize.

Years ago when this promotion first began, I would win on at least every second coffee, just a coffee or a donut, but a win just the same. The coffee didn’t cost the company much and the donut was probably not too expensive either. What it did is to build a large number of dedicated consumers that would have their coffee at Tim’s not only during the promotion, but during the rest of the year as well. Now, they seem to have made it more difficult to win a coffee, but I guess like in most businesses, the bottom line is king. Too bad!

Louise wrote the blog last night and I think she did a pretty good job. I was feeling a little over whelmed and decided that there was no reason to write the blog last night. Thanks for keeping it going Louise; I may call on you more often. Maybe I should get Hurricane to write the blog one day soon, that way we could get a six year old perspective on life. Maybe not though.

I would be upset when he became more popular than I am; I wouldn’t be surprised, just upset. I’m going to give him a few more years.

Have a good night and if you live in Canada or a small section of the US, don’t forget to “ROLL UP THE RIM”, you just might get a free coffee, donut or Toyota Corolla.