So this weekend, I was helping Hayley find a misplaced item. I was looking through our stack of mail and came across an ad for a car dealership. The ad caught my eye because there was a key attached to it. I looked a little closer, and the mailer--addressed to Hayley--said we may have won a brand new Charger. For fun, I pulled the key off of the ad, and used it to scratch off the "scratch here" box to see if I was a winner. Three silver cars means you win. Any other combination of silver and red cars means you lost.
So I start scratching and the oddest thing happened. I scratched away to reveal three silver cars... I was a winner! I was a little shocked, and said, out loud, and in an incredulous voice, "I'm a winner...?" Hayley responded asking me what I meant, and I told her we might have won a new car. She immediately said, "Yeah, right..." but came over to look at the advertisement. We both kind of looked at each other and wondered what in the world was going on. There was a telephone number printed on the ad, so I called it. A recording asked me to enter a number from the ad, then told me, "Congratulations! Your prize is being held for you. Please see your local dealer at [address] to claim your prize!" Again, not much help on figuring out what was going on.
So, we had a couple errands to run and decided, what the heck... if the dealer told us we didn't win a car, we'd simply hate them forever and never buy a car from them. When we pulled up to the dealership, a 12 year old with uneven, scruffy, facial hair trying to hide his acne approached us. I told him we had this ad and it said we won something. He had us sit down and went to get a little notebook. He started asking a few questions (address, name, car we drive, you know...), and I butted in by saying we really weren't looking for a car, just wondered about this prize we supposedly won. He said it could be one of four prizes. The new Charger, an ATV, three gold coins, or $1,000 cash--all with no strings attached, but he needed to get our information first. He asked about the car we drive and if we were looking to trade it in. Again, I said no. At this point, our 12 year old assistant went off to get one more scratch card so we could find out what we won.
Left to ourselves, Hayley and I wondered if this was worth it. I said I hoped for the thousand bucks, but wondered what we could get on eBay for the three gold coins. Well, the pre-pubescent came back, I scratched the card, and lo and behold.... THREE GOLD COINS!!! What luck! The sixth grader then left again, and Hayley and I shrugged our shoulders at each other and waited for our prize. The kid came back with three dollars. In coin form. Sacajawea and Ben Franklin coin dollars, to be exact. Here they are in all their glory:
So yeah. Stupid car salesmen. As we drove away, Hayley wondered, if we had said we were looking for a car, would our second scratch card have been pulled from a different stack... possibly the you've-won-a-thousand-dollars stack? Maybe even the you've-won-a-new-car stack? Very probably... One thing's for sure though. I couldn't stop saying "THREE GOLD COINS!" The rest of the day.
9 comments:
Tricky car salesmen and their false advertising! We'll never buy a car from them FOR SURE! You fsiledto mention his awful outfit!
Oh and for the record, it was addressed to me. So you should at least say we instead of I. ;)
and in the end, it was just another adventure with you so really I have no regrets.
Oh yeah... I think he was wearing his dad's suit...
And let the record show that the ad was addressed to Hayley. :)
We got 5 of those gold coins from a dealer in Iowa. We bought ice cream with ours.
HA! (And yes, that was an official G-Ward HA!)
A-freakin-mazing.
So what your saying is the salesman was young? I just want to be sure I understand:) Congrats on your Three Gold Coins!
Oh my gosh that's hilarious! Yay for getting three gold coins!! :)
That reminds me of the time DeAnne and I got an invitation to go up to Bear Lake to purchase a time share. Just for listing to their sales presentation we would be guaranteed to win one of four prizes. I can’t remember what the two big prizes were, but the two cheapest ones were a new Deluxe Dolphin Luxury boat or $100 in cash.
We had no intention of buying a time share. We were pretty confident that we would be awarded the cheapest prize. We decided it would be worth the trip from West Jordan to Bear Lake to listen to their spill. We figured we would take a lunch and all the kids and have a little outing with them. We figured with all our kids running around and screaming the sales presentation they would keep it short and we would be happy with the $100 cash. With the $100 we could stop on our way home and buy dinner for us and the kids and still have a nice day enjoying Bear Lake and the outdoors.
We were pleasantly surprised, when, after the meeting, they told us we had won the Deluxe Dolphin Luxury Boat and starting wondering how we would be able to tow it back home. When they brought it out, it was a two man rubber raft with a picture of a dolphin on the side, about a $25 value. The kids may remember it. But I guess that is better than your 3 gold coins.
Sales people become desperate when times are tuff. Our sales people at work have a joke amongst them that no sales person will get to heaven.
Ha! Ok, can I tell you that I love the fact that, not only did you go through with it and follow the pathway (because we're far too lazy) but that you blogged about it! You guys rock! If it's any consolation to you, I really enjoyed reading the post!
Post a Comment