Saturday, April 17, 2010

I Won!

Today I got an ad in the mail that was addressed generically to Resident. It had a key taped to it and said, "You could drive away with this 2010 Ford!" Below that it had a scratch and win, if you got three gold bars you were a winner!! Well I got three gold bars. In order to collect my unmentioned prize I must go to the event headquarters. The first thing that crossed my mind is this is a scam to get my information so that they can attempt to sell my poor college butt a car.

I started to wonder if this was ethical. The prizes are usually barely anything, and always come with a catch. People give out information and are continually sought after that. Is it any different than any other form of advertising?

Being a business major, I know the benefits of direct selling. I also know that it is common and not unethical. This ad is an ineffective form of direct selling. But there is a fine line between ethical and unethical. I think that ads like this are on the verge of unethical. It makes me wonder how many of the other letters have three gold bars, how many other "players" are winners. Maybe I am just being a pessimist, thinking that there is no way I could have won so it must be a scam. Maybe I really did win! I guess I will never know.

Have you received ads like this? How do you react to them? Take a bite, I want to know.

2 comments:

  1. I have received ads like that and have actually gone to the dealer on a specific date that I was told to see what the deal was. They were actually holding drawings for certain prizes that whole day and a car was included. I didn't win. I just won the simple prize that I guess everyone won being a candle and some other item, but they were all out and gave me a rain check to come back for it, but I never went back.

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  2. That reminds me, I know this one family who went down around Thanksgiving to get a free turkey the dealership was handing out. They walked away with a car. Advertising sure is funny.

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