Adult Games

Advertising as torture
It is inherent to people to get used to everything, even to everyday importunate TV advertising. One day the author of the publication spent a whole day in front of a TV set searching for some new advertising.
As it turned out, these are companies selling inexpensive items that usually organize promotional actions; they make much money by selling large amounts of sold goods. They lure more clients with suggestive slogans "Buy more and get higher chances"; thus they expect that people who are greedy by nature will swallow the bait.

One married couple who liked beer got so deeply plunged into a promotional action of a beer company that they bought more and more beer cans with a view to collect as many can openers as possible. The promotional action promised a tour to Australia to those who gather as many can openers as possible. The family emptied 6-8 and even sometimes 10 beer cans within an evening cherishing the only dream of getting to Australia. Finally, they won no tour to Australia, and got even more disappointed when they got no prize at all.

It has already become traditional that beer producers urge people to buy more beer with the slogan "Look under the cover!", but still the slogan is rather effective. There are several companies that lure customers with the slogan this summer. The Russian beer Tri Bogatyrya (Three Heroes) and other old rivals are especially active with this slogan this summer. Main prizes of promotional actions of this kind are traditionally luxurious life; with a stake on the youth beer producers offer the winner and two of his friends a tour about the three fashionable summer places: London-Ibiza-Australia. In the framework of the promotional action "Save the World with Terminator!" a winner could win a trip to the Hollywood where Terminator-3 was shot.

One more company that lures clients with its promotional action this summer is Lipton tea; the company offers a prize for a winner who suggests its own summer symbol. This is one trip for a group of four to a 3-day MTV party in France. The organizers of the action say: "What is your idea of the summer symbol? Is it an island and the sea, a breath of fresh breeze, a scooter furrowing the sea or an ice lemon drink? Just imagine this and lay it out with Lipton tea bag tags on a white sheet of paper." It is said that the most extraordinary image will be the winner in the contest.

Another bait which is sure to attract many people is a car as the main prize. A cigarette producer making LD, the cigarettes of moderate cost started a promotional action with an automobile as the key prize this summer. The company offers to collect 10 tops from LD cigarette boxes and to fill in a questionnaire. At the second stage of the action participants of the action may win 10 Ford Focus cars.

Chips producers have launched a promotional action called "Bankomania" where 6 cars are the prizes. People wishing to win a Peugeot-206 must first find a winning token, and then they should call some definite telephone number and answer several questions concerning chips. Lucky winners will be able to get their prizes only in three cities of Russia: Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Novorossiisk and Sochi.

The last innovation in the sphere of promotional actions is to inform about terms of the action not through websites and newspaper publications, but by making clients call a multi-channel phone number. At that, companies combine an advertising campaign with a free sociological survey.

Once the author of the publication reached an information telephone line of Bond cigarettes and heard an answering machine on the other end of the line. The machine was saying: "This conversation with an operator will be recorded and further submitted to the organizers of the Bond promotional action for information purposes. You may disconnect if you disagree. The Health Ministry warns that smoking is harmful for your health." So, with the only objective to find out the terms of the promotional action, the girl had to answer many questions; only after answering the first portion of questions she learnt some terms of the action. After that, she still had to answer even more questions of the operator. As it turned out, in the framework of the action "Appreciate Real Things!" people can win three summer cottages and 500 barbecue sets. 

The next call was to the information line of the Tri Bogatyrya (Three Heroes) beer. The operators were as terse as special services agents. They said that the prizes of the action were a beer mug, a beer glass and the main prize was 100 liters of beer in 0.5 liter bottles. It was said at that, every third lid of the Tri Bogatyrya beer was winning. One lid is thus exchanged for one prize. Neither the exact number of prizes nor the number of winning beer bottles are announced at that.

A friend of the author's imparted very interesting news: her husband and she like to participate in all promotional actions organized by beer producers. They have already bought at least 20 bottles of Tri Bogatyrya beer, but failed to get at least one winning lid. It is said that even very active participants of such actions win only cigarette lighters, beer mugs and T-shirts, but never larger prizes.

Marianna Shamina
Argumenty I Facty – Chelyabinsk