Supermarket blunder Disney go down well
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DO you have a tendency to collect things?
Are you a sucker for voucher schemes run by newspapers or supermarkets?
Having grown out of stamp collecting by the age of eight and got over football stickers in the aftermath of the 1978 World Cup (enough said), I’d normally answer “no” to both of those questions.
Until, that is, falling hook, line and sinker for an innocuous looking promotion run by Morrisons. The fishing analogy is perhaps fitting too as the chain was pretty close to reeling me in from another major player which already has first dibs on the weekly supermarket shop spend.
If you have children of a certain age and tend to frequent superstores, chances are you’ll have encountered Morrisons’ Disney promotion. To mark the 20th anniversary of Disneyland Paris, the chain enticed shoppers with the chance of winning a holiday to the French theme park plus hundreds of thousands of Disney soft toys by collecting cards.
Our family came to the promotion fairly late in the day but the marketing worked an absolute treat. Suddenly I was justifying the purchase of multiple bottles of Heinz tomato ketchup (each of which came with a “free” packet of cards) and showing an unusual interest in a certain brand of bread (ditto).
Now, while the cards (Bambi, Thumper and Dopey, amongst 96 others) are in reality worth no more than the paper they’re printed on (not for another 10 or 20 years, anyway), that didn’t prevent a veritable gold rush on the things.
So popular was the promotion that Morrisons brought forward the close. Parents were presenting doe-eyed children in front of cashiers in the hope of perhaps being slipped an extra pack. My daughter’s Bambi impersonation did the trick on one occasion, it has to be said.
The really big enticement (the one that hooked the children) was the prospect of finding a “golden card”, bringing with it the entitlement (perhaps with a few strings attached) of a trip to Disneyland itself.
My daughter developed a hitherto unobserved interest in helping out with the supermarket shopping, and would frequently note that we were starting to get a bit low on milk. Or tomato sauce.
Now it doesn’t take a genius to realise that masters of marketing ruthlessly target children, generally taking care to stay within regulations laid down by the likes of the Advertising Standards Authority. They reserve their best work for the three months leading up to Christmas when their eyes are fixed firmly on a multibillion-pound global spend.
Perhaps because of its enduring appeal down the years, the Disney wheeze captured the attention of a broad audience, tapping into the nostalgic memory banks of parents who grew up on Cinderella italicsand 101 Dalmations.
As the “doubles” started to mount up, sharp card trading ensued with neighbouring kids. My only gripe with the whole shebang came on the final weekend of the promotion when Morrisons upped the ante by offering to double the number of packs handed out.
It was only at the checkout — after handing over the cash for my year’s supply of ketchup — that a slightly embarrassed looking cashier let me know they didn’t, in fact, have any cards left.
Wasn’t that some breach of contract with their customers? On the one hand, they say (on their own website) that “there are still winning cards to be found, so if you find one you and your family could be going on a fairytale VIP holiday to Disneyland Paris!” In my case, there were no cards to be found at all, winning or otherwise.
An email to customer services prompted an abject apology and offer of two packs of cards (where did they come from?) by way of compensation. TWO packs? I’m due at least eight! Unless they’re packing Simba, Bashful, Tinkerbell and Rapunzel, this isn’t over!
On the plus side, I don’t need to buy any ketchup until at least 2014...
