I’m sitting in a hotel room in Jacksonville, FL going through my email listening to the person in the room next to me cough like someone who smokes a six-pack of Lucky Strikes a day. At the same time, I realize that the TV in my room has been on Lifetime for the past hour.
Jacksonville?
Indeed! I’m here today and tomorrow meeting with the marketing folks at web.com, parent company of Solid Cactus, to discuss some of our ongoing eCommerce marketing projects. After a day packed full of brain-storming, a group of us headed to Maggiano’s for dinner.
I’ve been to my share of Italian joints, from the chains like Maggiano’s and Carabbas to family run holes-in-the-wall where the kitchen may be dirty but the food is pretty damn good. We opted for the “family style” dinner where the food kept coming and the calorie count kept rising.
When we arrived, I opted to valet park the car. Being in south Florida a lot, everywhere you go there is valet parking. If you go to the Pubix in Palm Beach, there’s someone to park you car. Need to pick up something at Macy’s? Valet. I’m convinced that valet parking is so common due to the number of elderly people who drive but just can’t park between the lines, so to avoid damage claims arising from fender benders in parking lots, shopping center owners hire valets.
I paid the five-bucks for the valet and got my ticket, which happened to have a coupon on the stub for 10% off service at any Jacksonville area Lexus dealer. Not gonna help me much as I drive a BMW. Makes and models aside, this is the first time I’ve seen ads on a valet stub and I’ve done some unique advertising over the years. Those from the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton area may remember ads for my FerretStore.com at the urinals and in the stalls in the rest rooms at the First Union, then Wachovia, now the Mohegan Sun Arena.
While intrigued enough with the valet stub to bring it back with me to add to my collection of marketing tid-bits, something caught my eye that made this marketing campaign fizzle. The coupon for 10% off service at any Jacksonville area Lexus dealer expired on December 31, 2009 and today is the 25th of January, 2010.
Like any good Italian chef would tell you, the mozzarella ain’t any good after the expiration date so don’t use it. The same thing goes for time sensitive valet tickets and marketing campaigns.