Saturday, May 02, 2009

The Hard Sell

While wandering Glasgow town centre investigating coffee houses (don't ask), I decided to stop in at Subway for a bite of lunch. (The people who put together my food plan also investigated fast food offerings. Subway have an entire menu I can select from.)

Just as I turned into the street bearing the store, I was accosted by a gent.

"Do you go to Subway often?" he asked.

"Sometimes," said I. "In fact, I'm just going there now."

"How would you like to eat for free at Subway right though to the end of the year, for a one off payment of £10? How does that sound?"

"It sounds too good to be true," I replied.

Unfortunately, this turned out to be correct. What they were actually selling was a glorified "buy one, get one free" scheme, whereby if I and a friend went to Subway, I could order sandwiches similar to those of said friend for free. Also, there were a bunch of vouchers giving me a free sandwich if I bought a drink.

Oh, and it applied only in a particular set of stores, notably excluding the two I am actually likely to visit often. Shame.

"I'm going to decline," I said. "The reason I don't get a drink is that I'm trying to avoid liquid calories, so these vouchers aren't of any use to me."

"Well, you could always get a water..." he said.

The vouchers actually clearly stated on them that they only applied to particular drinks. Water was not in that category. I'm going to be charitable, and say he must not have realised the conditions of the offer he was making... although my suspicions are otherwise.

But I'm a bit annoyed. I said no. That should have been the end of it.

Anyway, I finished with what I should have said in the first place. "I'm going to decline," I said, and walked away.

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