but you had to put two dimes in the machine to get them. The machines didn't give change back then, so I used to help my father make slits in the top of the cigarette packs, then he'd put two pennies inside. That was how he made sure the customers got their change.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Marketing 101
Would love to know what a B school professor would make of this one--my high school classmate Marge Gagnon recalls life at Charlie's Tydol, her father's gas station in Manchester, New Hampshire, in the 1950s (link). "Cigarettes sold for 18 cents a pack," Marge said,
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Some of the boys over here in Marketing Consultancy USA spent three minutes brainstorming the problem and here's what we came up with:
There are never problems. There are only opportunities. Your opportunities include:
• Raising the price of cigarettes 2 cents and avoiding the whole problem. A marketing consultant would gladly conduct a cost-benefits study to determine whether the price increase would pay for the loss of business.
• Sell cost-benefits studies (or the results of yours) to other filling stations facing the same problem
• Persuade cigarette companies to pack cigarettes with 2 cents change under the cellophane
• Invent an easy-insert doo-hickey that more easily inserts the 2 cents under the cellophane
• Don't give 2 cents change but offer a promotion – buy cigarettes here, get 2 cents worth of gasoline FREE!
• Invent some sort of special record book that has a name for each customer and a record of his purchases. Automatically pump a gallon for him when he has accumulated the price of a gallon.
• Sell the record book to other stations that still face your former problem.
• Image or branding campaign to build good will: Put up signs that say, "We care about our customers' health. So we don't sell cigarettes."
• Co-op promotion. "Poison your brain along with your lungs. Free copy of the Manchester Union-Leader with every pack of cancer sticks you buy."
Sorry, your time is up. Deposit $1,000 for your next 3-minute consultative session.
Yours crankily,
The New York Crank
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