A Random Suggestion
“Aw, how nice!” I thought upon receiving the latest e-mail from Harry & David. Apparently today is Random Acts of Kindness Day (who knew, eh?), so the food gifts merchant sent out an e-mail with the subject line “Today ONLY: FREE Delivery Sitewide - our Random Act of Kindness.” The message suggested that we “delight someone ‘just because’” by sending him or her a tasty treat.
But something about the promotion proceeded to rub me the wrong way.
Maybe it’s because, on Harry & David’s part, the act of offering free shipping seems less random and more a premeditated effort to boost sales. Not that there’s anything wrong with driving revenue, but to do so under the guise of selflessness seems a bit disingenuous, not to mention tacky.
Then there’s the fact that Harry & David isn’t so much committing a random act of kindness as trying to guilt others into doing so. It reminds me of those benefit recordings, in which a slew of multimillionaire pop stars donate an hour of their time in exchange for oodles of good publicity—oops, I mean in order to produce a song for the masses to purchase so that the monies collected can help the quake victims in Haiti or whatever the cause du jour is. Why don’t the multimillionaire pop stars simply donate their own dollars to the cause, instead of cajoling us to do so?
A true random act of kindness on the part of Harry & David would have been if it delivered free goodies to, say, a dozen or so randomly selected customers across the country, “just because.” It would have been interesting to see if doing so stimulated any spontaneous word of mouth that the company could then have picked up on.
Of course, the day is still young. Maybe Harry & David is doing just that right now. And if it isn’t but decides to take my advice next year, it would be an act of kindness to send me a gift basket as a thank-you.
February 17th, 2010 at 2:24 pm
Maybe if Harry&David had offered a choice of 3 free gifts, just pay for the shipping would have seemed more selfless. Free shipping alone seems more like, “free novacaine” at the dentist.
Wonder if they tested different offers?
February 18th, 2010 at 7:16 am
“‘Free novacaine’ at the dentist”–that’s brilliant! Wish I’d thought of it…
February 23rd, 2010 at 3:22 pm
If only novacaine WAS free at the dentist… I’d go stock up!