Was That A Goat?

Back in the day, it was commonplace to see some completely whacky promotional concepts used to attract potential customers to automobile dealerships in order to sell cars. One dealer operating in Southern California would offer potential customers 10,000 Blue-Chip Stamps just to test-drive one of their vehicles, and over the years we saw offers of a free toaster, food and/or drink, sports tickets, team merchandise, trips to amusement parks, even free elephant rides, just for coming into the dealership and test-driving one of the vehicles that the dealer was having trouble unloading on its own merits. In recent years, we’ve seen even more elaborate rewards offered for actually purchasing one of these cars, including offers of free maintenance for life, three years of reduced-cost gasoline, or even offers to buy the car back if you don’t want it/can’t afford it anymore. But this is the first time I’ve ever seen livestock appear in such an offer…

A story being reported this week in the Courier & Mail of Queensland, Australia, indicates that Mitsubishi Motors is offering a free goat to any customer in New Zealand who purchases one of its new Triton utility vehicles. The idea here being that goats are also tough, hearty, useful things that can go over any terrain and are helpful to farmers. Apparently, people in New Zealand like goats a whole lot more than we had realized. Of course, for those who don’t live on a farm (or already have a sufficient number of goats), the company is also offering a “no-goat” option that includes such extras as a 5-year/100,000 km warranty and $500 worth of accessories. Since each of the elements offered in the “no-goat” package costs more than an actual goat does, we should probably conclude that the goat offer is a joke…

Which is not to say, of course, that Mitsubishi wouldn’t give you an actual goat if you wanted one; I suspect that at least some of their customers from more rural parts of the country will request the goat option, if only for the fun of watching their local dealer go down to the nearest goat farm and actually purchase a goat. And it’s important to note that in the current day, most auto makers have some form of incentive for purchasing one of their vehicles, even if that’s just an extended warranty or a roadside assistance program. All Mitsubishi is actually doing here is using a common form of business promotion to make a most uncommon offer – and hopefully draw your attention…

In the average week, you’ll probably see dozens of ads for different kinds of cars – possibly thousands or millions of them, if you are watching sports on television for any significant part of the week. This huge amount of clutter, or “noise,” will tend to keep you from paying attention to any one specific ad, even if you are actually in the market to purchase a new vehicle. If the goat ad cuts through the clutter and draws your attention despite the mass of background noise, then the while promotion has served its purpose; if you actually buy the goat-car, so much the better…

And since an actual goat typically costs $100 to $300, while the “no-goat” package has at least $1,000 worth of goods and services, and automobile “rebate” programs can sometimes reach into the $5,000 to $10,000 range, Mitsubishi would probably be quite happy to have its local dealer go out and buy you a goat. Assuming that you want one, of course…