The $39 Experiment

[dgridley]

I used to do product reviews and one of the greatest difficulties was finding the right person or department to contact for review products or press kits, so I can sympathize with this guy. He searched all the products in his home for mailing addresses and contacted the companies asking for free stuff.

Here are the details and results of his $39 Experiment (Cost him $39 for postage to 100 companies):

http://www.the39dollarexperiment.com/

 

[B33R]

Cool!

I love his BMW and Mercedes letters:

Dear Sir or Madam:
I'm going to be honest with you. I am a poor slob who drives a bike. Not a motorcycle – a bicycle. Please send me a BMW keychain, so I can at least pretend to have some class when I'm around people. Thank you in advance,
Tom Locke, self-esteem enthusiast

:lol:

 

[dgridley]

You probably have no idea what you can get companies to send if you reach the right people.. my buddie's house in NY was so full of stuff he got for reviews you literally had to clear paths to walk around the house. I'm not joking either!

Cool!

I love his BMW and Mercedes letters:

:lol:

 

[Sabre]

It's pretty amazing what some companies will give away for free nowadays.

I guess they figure if they give you free stuff then it'll shut you up :D

 

[rontol]

I used to do product reviews and one of the greatest difficulties was finding the right person or department to contact for review products or press kits, so I can sympathize with this guy. He searched all the products in his home for mailing addresses and contacted the companies asking for free stuff.

Here are the details and results of his $39 Experiment (Cost him $39 for postage to 100 companies):

http://www.the39dollarexperiment.com/

haha...i like his idea...
It's great to know that those big company could give you freebies if you write to them.

How if i write a letter to Godaddy? :hehe:

 

[deleted984054565403]

Haha, I used to do this. It's cool that the guy is documenting it, though.

 

[jeter4982]

That is really interesting. I found it funny that several of the companies he sent requests to were owned by Pepsi, so in reality he was asking for several free products from Pepsi. Thanks for sharing Dave! :tu:

Tom

 

[labrocca]

His page is a PR6 too. It's a great little read.

 

[mis_chiff]

I wonder...If he wrote to the post office...
would they give him the stamps for free :lol:

 

[_FLIP_]

Haha, I love it.

I like how he tell Subway that he hates Quiznos. Then the letter under it is one to Quiznos saying he hates Subway.

I'm thinking about sending a letter to some of the companys that gave him something. :D

 

[RegFee]

I wonder...If he wrote to the post office...
would they give him the stamps for free :lol:

Hey-oh!

I like the "technical" part. I WAS going to write him and tell him he was doing some false advertising

 

[Jim_]

I love his BMW and Mercedes letters

Agreed! :lol:

 

[Joey]

That was a really interesting -- and cool experiment. Thanks for sharing!

 

[E-Thunder]

Lol! I also like the BMW/Mercedes letters!

 

[broadwayad]

must be nice to have that much free time, maybe if i got off the computer more i could do it. great story but think ill just read about it on the web

 

[franchise]

That was awesome. I just love stuff like this. Way to go...good find Dave.

 

[Grey_OwL]

That's a great experiment. Good post.

 

[dgridley]

Anyone here tried similar? I've just started building up a list of PR addresses to start reviewing again..

 

[jeter4982]

Anyone here tried similar? I've just started building up a list of PR addresses to start reviewing again..

I was actually thinking about doing the same thing for one of my blogs. My only concern is that my blog is tech related, and I don't know how willing the big tech companies are going to be to send out free stuff. Sending out a candy bar for free is a lot less of a sacrifice for a company then sending out anything a tech company has to offer. Who knows though maybe I will still do it...

Tom

 

[RegFee]

Anyone here tried similar? I've just started building up a list of PR addresses to start reviewing again..

I was actually thinking about doing the same thing for one of my blogs. My only concern is that my blog is tech related, and I don't know how willing the big tech companies are going to be to send out free stuff. Sending out a candy bar for free is a lot less of a sacrifice for a company then sending out anything a tech company has to offer. Who knows though maybe I will still do it...

Tom

It can't hurt to try! I imagine there are departments of people whose job is to stuff samples into envelopes and mail them. I think the $39 experiment guy appealed to these people on a personal level with his creative and mostly unique letters, so he probably got a couple of extra candy bars "by mistake." Send a creative letter to a guy at a computer hardware plant who gets the same "I want Free StUff" letters every day, and maybe he'll send you a USB thumbdrive or something. You never know