Free stuff… I’ll shop there!

I had a very pleasant experience at the mall last week. Before I headed to the WV SADD retreat which was a couple hours drive away, I needed to purchase some new tires. My dad went to purchase the tires, and on the way back home, discovered that I needed an oil change and alignment.

Dad had an appointment so I was the one who went out for the car maintenance. The best price happened to be at a mall department store. The car was going to take about an hour to be serviced, so I decided to browse through the mall. I had a bad craving for a pretzel and stopped at the pretzel store. I remembered that I had bought a discount card at school. The card gives discounts for different restaurants and food places; the pretzel store gives “buy one get one free” on pretzels for that store.

The store had a new manager, and he came out to see the customers. As I was picking up my pretzels, he insisted on me trying out a couple sandwiches—a pepperoni roll and a hot ham and cheese sandwich. They were both delicious, but more than that, they were free.

 Without even realizing it, I had just been subjected to a very effective form of marketing. Receiving those sandwiches for free made me feel great about my purchase and about the store. The store may have given back some of its profit, but it knows that I enjoyed receiving the free products and will likely return.

Personally, I hope more companies begin using the “free” business model.  As a student, I don’t have a lot of free dough in my wallet. Maybe if I received more free goodies, I might be more willing to fork some of my money up. Yes, the economy may be bad for business, but this is the time for companies to start giving a little back.