Thursday, November 7, 2013

GET A FREE iPAD!

How many times have you seen that?

All the damn time. Every medical journal, CME service, and medical supply company has some such crap. If you order the gold-level service you get an iPad-mini, go with the platinum and you get an iPad. My wife has seen it from companies selling school nurse supplies in bulk

Of course, the iPad isn't really "free." Its cost is figured into whatever they're charging you for the purchase, or they're taking a slight loss hoping to get you as a loyal customer (doesn't work, guys. Ask any pharmacist who's forced to hand out gift cards to people who transfer a prescription).

But I digress.

Anyway, my point here is that pretty much EVERY professional level product is often sold with a "get a free iPad" gimmick.

Including, apparently, rats.




Yes, lab researchers, now you too can get a free iPad with your order of research rodents. Need some transgenic rats to test antibiotics? You've got an iPad-Mini! Doing cancer research on knockout rats? Get an iPad!


"Wait, where's the iPad they promised me?"

Be sure to use the promo code, which ingeniously is RatPadB13.

After all, with an iPad you don't need a mouse.

Thank you, Caillin!
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15 comments:

  1. PattiNovember 7, 2013 at 7:23 AM

    Love the pharmacist comment! So freakin' true!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wendy at Taking the Long Way HomeNovember 7, 2013 at 9:18 AM

    So our former family dentist continually sends me email blasts offering a chance for a free iPad just for being their patient. This is the dentist who mixed up my boys and filled teeth on the wrong son (who didn't need his teeth filled), who kept telling me I needed my asymptomatic silver fillings replaced, etc,

    My new dentist? No frills office, let me pay off my major (and necessary) dental work over time. And has never suggested disturbing those silver fillings. He hasn't offered me a free iPad, tho.

    ReplyDelete
  3. JenniferNovember 7, 2013 at 9:27 AM

    I need rats too - for my daughter's snakes. I wonder if I can talk the petstore into the same deal...

    ReplyDelete
  4. PackerNovember 7, 2013 at 9:31 AM

    TANSTAAFIP

    Look it is hook marketing, tried and true.
    Doesn't require any thought to the marketing campaign, it is one that can be modified into myriad permutations.
    Buy product get free shiatsu massage delivered by scantily clad masseuse, lunch at top of the park, hot air balloon ride, etc. etc.

    A true marketing genius would be the one who would make you want a rat so much that you wouldn't give a rat's ass how you got it.
    Your problem is you know you want the rat but you don't want to feel like you have been hooked. Just get over it.

    ReplyDelete
  5. MBee170November 7, 2013 at 10:41 AM

    The google ad at the top of my page is for an exterminator...

    ReplyDelete
  6. MooseNovember 7, 2013 at 12:02 PM

    Did you know that the Cray T3D - one of the last of the Cray big iron (everything [mostly] in one box) supercomputers - came with a free Mac Powerbook?

    Unfortunately it was embedded into the front of the machine and was programmed to do nothing but draw pretty pictures. What a waste.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Fulfilling FoodieNovember 7, 2013 at 12:25 PM

    As someone who works in the biomedical research field. I forwarded this to my supervisor with the tag line "can I haz?" and lots of lolz.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Ms. DonnaNovember 7, 2013 at 1:19 PM

    Having worked in the psych lab (as STUDENT not SUBJECT!!!) while in college, Had bags and bags of "Purina Rat Chow" to heft and stock.

    Can I get an iPad, too?

    Only kidding. At risk of starting Apple/not Apple war, I don't use products from Cupertino, Calif.

    I have used Apple and not Apple products personally and professionally, and BOTH are good. The difference to me is that I can try to fix a non-Apple product myself w/o waiting for some "guru" to come and condescend.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Ivan IlyichNovember 7, 2013 at 2:43 PM

    You laugh, but an iPad is a truly useful thing.

    The earliest Cray "big iron" machines came with a case of Leinenkugel, but it was for the installation team, not the customer.

    ReplyDelete
  10. meganNovember 7, 2013 at 5:01 PM

    I'm going to the Society for Neuroscience meeting in a couple days...my office mailbox is FILLED with promo cards from all of the vendors with those iPad offers. A few years ago it was a free iPod...

    ReplyDelete
  11. Officer CynicalNovember 7, 2013 at 7:29 PM

    If I buy an iPad, can I get a free rat?

    ReplyDelete
  12. WarmSocksNovember 8, 2013 at 12:32 AM

    Wait! People pay money to obtain rats? We pay the kids 50 cents a head to kill them.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Jen MNovember 8, 2013 at 9:35 AM

    We currently have a "deal" with one of our lab disposables supply companies. Spend $500 with them and get a free night out at the movies. And by "free night out at the movies," they mean one movie ticket for every $500 spent. DO YOU EVEN KNOW how many pipette tips and microfuge tubes you have to buy to spend $500?!?! I don't even have the cabinet space to store everything.

    I can only imagine how much crap I'd have to buy to get an iPad...

    ReplyDelete
  14. Doc MooNovember 8, 2013 at 4:09 PM

    These "win an ipad" and "free ipad" faxes come into my veterinary office almost daily. The reps even offer them and seem taken aback when I tell them I don't give a rat's a** about an ipad. Apparently telling them that if I wanted one I would already have one doesn't seem rational to them. They should be handing out Keurig machines. Then again, I already have one.

    ReplyDelete
  15. LinNovember 9, 2013 at 8:56 PM

    Admit it, this entire blog post was just so you could use the pun at the end.

    ReplyDelete

So wadda you think?