As a kid I had a Smith-Corona manual typewriter which I used to write companies for free stuff. Companies like Old Dutch and Kellogg's mostly sent stickers or the little boxes of cereal...the exact same stuff they deliver door to door when they have a new flavor to promote.
As a teen I got tons of jet posters, stickers, patches and the like from writing aircraft companies like Lockheed Martin and Boeing and especially Grumman. Grumman sent us a ton of stuff for our garage clubhouse. I was totally into being a jet pilot back then (and that was BEFORE the release of Top Gun) so studying the schematics was interesting to me.
When I started teaching I had the kids do a report on a nation other than Canada. First we wrote to the foreign embassies in Canada for information which they would use to start their investigations. Many, many countries sent great materials from their tourist bureaus - flags, stickers, buttons, ect..
One country however was the clear loser year after year - IRAN - we got one photostatic copy that looked like it was ran off an old spirit duplicating machine - you know the one you had to crank by hand to make copies. It had the weird purple colored ink and the paper was all shiny. It was like it came from 30 years ago. I think some facts about their population were out of date also. Fuck you Iran.
I have taught in a school where the staff approached the NHL Players Association for floor hockey equipment. No team even responded to us. Then we wrote the second letter informing each Canadian team that they were the ONLY Canadian team to not contribute. Within two weeks we had outfits and equipment for six teams. It took six months but in the end you can get your way if you have a little determination.
I am sure the Internet has tons of ways to get this free stuff but it's not the same. There was something about actually composing a letter and waiting for the package to arrive - if it ever did - that was exciting to me.
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4 comments:
I agree. I used to send for free stuff all the time. The anticipation of getting anything in the mail was tops. You used to be able to write companys like Alcoa and they would send you small ingots of aluminum and other goodies. And they used to call those printing machines mimeograph machines, and I used to love the smell of the blue-purple ink.
That is one clever three-and-a-half year old. And good on Sainsbury's, whoever they are, for being so awesome about it and having the good sense to agree.
Cool scam on the Canadian NHL teams, Cal. The cheap bastards.
I know. You can imagine I tell that story to anyone who will listen these days while all these millionaires squabble over pennies in the NHL.
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