Check out THIS recent 2Peas thread. Interesting, huh?
So this scrapper enters a blog contest, she wins, and then never receives the prize. Seems to be a common occurrence in the scrappy blog world these days. When I read about Connie’s plight with FLOWER SOFT, I wasn’t sure what to think. As I’ve gotten older (ahem…), one thing I’ve realized is that I should try to give people the benefit of the doubt more often. Instead of jumping right to the conclusion that these blog-prize-failing companies are super lame and suck big lemons, let’s back up and see if it wasn’t just a misunderstanding, a miscommunication, or something like that.
Luckily, this incident did have a happy ending, a contrite company who accepted full responsibility and fault, and a scrapper who got an even bigger prize than she originally won. Score!
As someone who has given blog RAKs away myself, I also have to be more understanding because I’ve been known to lag for quite some time before getting prizes in the mail to their deserving recipient. My excuse is that I get just plain get busy and either forget or honest-to-God don’t have the time. In the grand scheme of my life (3 jobs, mom, wife, scrapbook consultant, puppy owner, etc.), sometimes buying a prize and something to mail it in, and getting myself to the post office during their business hours ~ which happen to be the same as my work hours, darn it ~ isn’t higher on the priority list than working for pay, feeding my kids, and hassling my husband…erm, I mean…making life for my husband heaven on earth (good save, good save…right?).
Anyhoo, I do see a difference between me, lowly mom blogger who makes no money for this blog, and a company who is selling their product and therefore their image, customer service, and reputation. They have a VERY vested interest in keeping their prize winner (and all her scrappy friends) happy. If I piss you off, what’re you gonna’ do, quit reading my blog? NO NO NO! Don’t leave, Pissy Miss. I’m just sayin’. It’s apples and oranges.
But I do understand that life sometimes gets in the way. Sometimes mistakes are made. Now, sometimes people are buh-twipes too, you just never know. The point is ~ and I DO have a point ~ that if you’re a scrapbooking company, you DO NOT want to piss off a scrapbooker if you care to stay in business past this coming Friday. On the 2peas board, they call it the “Power of the Peas.” What that means is that 2peas is a FEE-YOU-JUS message board community and if a scrapper posts on there that they were somehow cheated or mistreated, the Peas (once they verify the story and that this isn’t some troll) are going to Back a Sister Up.
They will hunt you down and … well, okay, not really … but they will use the power of the internet to spread the word about your lousy company and you will rue the day ~ yes, I said RUE! ~ that you messed with a Pea. The best example I can give is the DONNA DOWNEY boycott. That happened 8 months ago and “we” are STILL boycotting everything she has a part in. I’ll just bet Donna is full of rue, don’t you think?
So just some ‘food for thought’ for you scrapbook company owners, bloggers, etc. out there in Scrap Land. If you promise a prize and you don’t deliver, we will patiently wait and politely pursue you. But if you ignore us or lie to us (don’t bother, we know how to take screen shots), we will take you down. Yes, we will take you down to China Town. (Oh, chill! I’m not being un-PC, I’m just quoting DeNiro in Meet the Parents…sheesh).
Or like my Italians say: “You messa with me, I messa with you. Capice?”
Capisco. Loud and clear, Vindictive Scrappy Girl, loud and clear…
4 Comments
I am rolling you are right. Hopefully life got in the way and she forgot to say that. I really hope they deliver the RAK to you .. ASAP.
I am sure this will get back and you will have a nice little mystery package in your mail box .. you know everybody likes to call everyone their best friends the minute they meet them ONCE .. so I am sure her best friends are contacting her ..
good luck.
I remember when that whole thing went down.
I occasionally run giveaways on my blogs, but I work mostly with indie artists. Still though, every time one ends, I hold my breath and simply hope that the artists send the prize quickly. So far, everything has worked out pretty well and I’d like to think it’s because I try to do as much research as I can on the artist before I agree to hold a giveaway.
But I’m still, going forward, I’m going to hold my breath and knock on wood everywhere because I, for one, do not want to be on the sh*tlist of any pea.
Interesting timing! I was wondering during this past week about offering some RAKs on my blog to try and boost readership and visibility. I truly am an attention seeking ego maniac :P
BUT issues like this make me very leary. I can see it going very wrong almost easier than I can see it going well. That doesn’t mean I might not still do it someday, but it does give me pause.
Because you know, I wouldn’t want to RUE the day!
LOL, whew! good thing I held my drawing on time, huh? I’d have the peas police after me! No, seriously, that would just be wrong and sad to get someone’s hopes up and then not deliver. Besides, it’s dishonest. Good job girlfriend in keeping us all on our toes. :)