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How To Get Free Stuff At Shows
Enigma5O writes "The TechZone heads to the 2006 Consumer Electronics Show and came out with tons of free stuff. We're not talking cheap pens or notepads either. No, they got some really cool stuff like two Sony PSP game consoles, DDR RAM, laptop roller bags, computer tool kit, etc. This article explains how they did it."
"Uh, we're from a, uh... tech review webs... err publication. We'd like to review your product and when I say review, I mean praise."
Yeah, and collaborate for free with the marketing machin... wait... did you say FREE?
gimmi gimmi gimmi
than "free pizza 4 life"
Seriously, social enginering is nothing new.
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
Did they get their server for free? /.ed already it seems.
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
I guess it says a lot about the spending power of slashdot. Not a single comment and the link is already /.ed.
2. Ask for stuff. Say you're going to do a review.
3. Profit!
Did they come out ahead? And did they have much of a choice or did they take anything just because it was free?
Getting free stuff is easy. Not getting caught is the hard part!
Get Your Free Stuff Here!
One of the nice perks about attending the yearly Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is all the manufacturers tries to load you up with free stuff.
[image of backpacks, PSPs, and a whole bunch of T-shirts and other small stuff]
You want free stuff? Man, do I have free stuff!
Yes it's true. Everything shown in the above photo was given to me for free! Some of the more noteworthy free stuff includes 1GB of OCZ RAM, an Ultra computer tool kit, CES laptop roller bags and two Sony PSP game consoles. And these are just the stuff that I haul back home with me. Bigger free stuff are being mailed.
There is a good chance that if you attended the CES you won't make off with as much free stuff as I did. This could be because you don't know the art of getting free stuff. Well, you're in luck because I'm going to give you the step by step to getting tons of free stuff at CES, or any other trade show for that matter.
Step 1 - Ask For The Free Stuff
If you want something you have to ask for it. Don't just walk up to a booth and expect them to hand free stuff out to you. It isn't going to happen. And if it does, it normally means some cheap free stuff like a notepad or a pen. If you don't ask, you don't get. If you're too shy to ask then go to the next step.
Step 2 - Attend The Press Conferences or Product Demos
One of the easiest way to getting free stuff is to simply attend the many press conferences or product demos that companies put on during the CES. They almost always have something good to give everyone who attends. And many will hold a contest for some really big prizes. Yes you have to sit through a demo to get your stuff but hey, it's free!
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"When ideology and theology couple, their offspring are not always bad but they are always blind." -- Bill Moyers
Another way to get free stuff, just walk around with two of these
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
I've tried this trick at several shows and it always works -
Approach the booth and say the gay codeword ("banana").. make sure to do that up and down thing with your eyebrows (that sort of "you know what I'm talkin about hehe" look), and then do that thing with your hand and your tongue that means "blowjob".
The all you have to do is follow through on the deal, and you'll get all kinds of free shit.
In my experience, the days of walking away from MacWorld/etc lugging bags full of stuff you actually want ended in about 2000 or so. Yes, there is still reasonable stuff but the scale is quite reduced from those crazy late 90s shows.
I have an offer here for a free vacation to the Caribbean. All I hafta do is sit through a presentation on an amazing offer on a timeshare in Florida.
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
"Getting it is easy. Filling it with illegal substances and sending it across the border is not."
Don't anthropomorphize computers: they hate that.
http://www.thetechzone.com.nyud.net:8090/?m=show&i d=479
How to use coral cache: http://slashdot.org.nyud.net:8090/~oscartheduck
...put offline a website with one post.
http://www.michel.eti.br
Too bad CES isn't open to the general public, and hotels around the area are all $$$ at that time (one of the bigger conventions). Free stuff is always good, but as usual, it ain't really free =)
....why is this news...?!?!?
...I went to Comdex and came away with a Noritake vacuum-florescent display that looked cool. The booth attendent gave me an odd look before he handed it to me.
My intention was to set it up as a system monitor, but I never got around to it. I've still got it, unused.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
about "How to get really really really really rich." "First, you take a million dollars. Then you..."
"How to get free stuff at a geek trade show filled with guys." "First, you be a really hot female. Then you..."
Step 3 - Make An Appointment
While all vendors on the show floor will talk to you about their products, you'll score major points and free stuff if you make an appointment to talk to them. This way the company is expecting you and will be prepare to give you their booth tour. After the tour, they always present you with a goodie bag fill with company information and, you guest it, free stuff!
Attend The CES Parties
Companies that put on parties at CES always have something to give to their guests when they leave. And there are tons of parties to attend during the 5 days that CES runs for. The problem is most, if not all, of the parties are invite only. Don't let this stop you however. Many times you can get an invite by emailing the company or going to their booth and asking for one. This really is the best way to get free stuff because you also get to attend a party as well.
Many companies that throw CES parties will have prizes to give away. That's how I got the Sony PSP. The best thing is many of these contests are the "can't lose" type. In other words, everyone who enters wins something.
Walk The Show Floor On The Last Day
The last day of CES is moving out day. This is best time to get your hands on tons of free stuff. Companies are packing things up to take home and many times they will lose their packing boxes. This is the best time to approach them to ask if there's anything they want to give away and not take home? It's amazing the amount times they will say "Help yourself to whatever you like." This is because it can cost them more to ship the products back home than the product is worth.
You won't get big items, like plasma TVs, for free but many times the companies will sell it to you for a stupidly low price. I remember one year when RCA was the official TV of CES and had their displays scatter throughout the convention center. Instead of packing the $3,000 TVs home, they offered it anyone who was willing to pay $500 for it.
Another reason to walk the show floor on the last day is you will find many abandon booths with stuff still left behind. Most of the time, the stuff is junk but you will come across some really nice stuff once in a while.
hang brain.
Handgun
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
So now thousands of geeks are going to be pestering booth workers to get free swag.. excellent idea. It's no wonder they have semi naked women standing around, it's too keep cultures like this distracted :/
I like muppets.
http://www.thetechzone.com.nyud.net:8090/?m=show&i d=479
If it hasn't already been posted.
1) Be a girl.
2) Tell the guys on the stall that they're cute
...bag fill with company information and, you guest it, free stuff!
Oh come on now. That's not a typo like 'teh', or a common mistake like 'their/there/they're'-- that's just plain wrong. I'm going to have to turn this matter over to the regional spelling police-- they might want to question you further.
Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. --Nietzsche
First, get elected to Congress...
// This is not a sig.
C'mon, baby, lemme finger your profile! Uh, click your mouse? Cable your box? Integrity check your data jack!
Wait! Where ya goin'? Oh, come on, work with me here!
*grumbles* Dammit, why dress in anime if you're not into geeks?
"Hey, the third matrix movie would have been good except for the plot,story, and acting." --AC
this post has the word "free stuff" in it... and now its been /.ed ? im so suprised :P
Julien. http://free.hostdepartment.com/8/81fortune/
Here in Slashdot people don't care if it's already been posted.
I think I'll submit an article about getting free stuff...
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http://thetechzone.com.nyud.net:8090/articles/e3-2 000/images/P5110008.jpg
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
Original is /.ed
i d=479
http://www.thetechzone.com.nyud.net:8090/?m=show&
They forgot to mention in that article that they won the PSPs at a party... also, I don't consider having to sit through a bad 20-minute demo to get a T-shirt "free". My time at those shows is worth more than a T-shirt.
I've staffed a couple of trade show stands in the past past. What we REALLY hated was people coming over and just saying.
"So what are you giving away then?"
Urgh - probably the same kind of people who work out their exact portion of the bill, sans tip.
Reminds me of this Las Vegas episode with the "king and queen of coupons" (and their freaky puppet that was saying "Feed me coupons").
If some people are happy to get freebies and collect coupons, and if they feel so proud of themselves to do so, then let it be. After all, this is a "free" country.
lucm, indeed.
My girlfriend always gets free stuff, wherever she goes (restaurants, bars, grocery stores...), thanks to some simple rules :
1. Smile.
2. The guy behind the counter is going to be here ALL day answering people's [questions demands] like a [robot slave]. He'll just give you 5 minutes, but even in such a short time, you can make a difference and treat him like the human being he is. Be friendly and do not let any opportunity to chit-chat with the guy pass by. Thank him for his time.
3. (optional) Have boobs.
Yes, I know, it's all so obvious. But it's also obvious that some people don't understand the simple magic of politeness. I've worked in a bar and rude or impatient clients would get f*9&% zilch from me.
They're like CES BoothBabes that you can play with, OUTSIDE!
The free stuff from movie studios started as a trickle, but then began to pour in. It was the usual tripe; posters, teasers, key fobs, gimmicks, and the like. But soon, he started to get "previewers copies" of DVDs. You know, the ones with the scroll on the bottom that states this is a copy for reviewers, unauthorized duplication is illegal, blah blah blah...
The worst had to be when the movie "Blade" was coming out. One day, a truck came by his house and dropped of 16 huge boxes (like 3 x 3 x 4 foot boxes) of foam ninja-[novelty flying disks]*-like things. "What am I going to do with all these foam [novelty flying disks]?" Each one was the size of a large pie plate, and due to the ninja-star-like cutout, they didn't fly so much as wobble like a potato chip and land about 2 feet away from you.
At his convention, he only got rid of half a box.
Then, in a brilliant idea, he used them for attic insulation. To this day, if you go into his attic, half his insulation is pulled-apart red foam crumbles with the words "Blade" on some of them. I wonder what the next owner of the house will think?
So how many magazines did he publish? Two. Shortly after the magazine's debut, he decided to get out of the publishing business. And 12+ years later, he's still getting free stuff.
--------
*You may substitute "[novelty flying disks]" with a brand name that rhymes with "Grisby"
I don't go to shows that would really have consumer type products to give away.
Example CeBit. CeBit is one of the largest (if not the largest) computer shows around. My dad used to work there every year, since his company had a large booth. I used to get a lot of free stuff when I was little, because I was really little then (everyone was at least somewhat cute when they were 9 years old, I guess I was).
There used to be some cool stuff that they gave away (StarOffice 3.1 CDs when it was still a German company for example), but I can't imagine why Nokia would give away free phones and to my knowledge (and my dad worked there for decades and knew many people from rival and partner companies and they would trade good stuff) they never did. Maybe this works for consoles, since they also make money from the games. Creative Labs would be another company that would have stuff useful to the end user and often attended CeBit, but they wanted to sell the stuff, not give it away (that's how they make a living, doh).
If You were writing about it, then it is an altogether different story, but this is old and we are not talking about it (press), since you don't have to go to shows for that but just ring up the company and tell them to send you a sample (that you will have to return most of the time, and won't be using for yourself anyways most of the time).
IBM won't give you a free Server, neither will AMD give away some Athlons. So we are left with the toys, some of which are expensive and really cool that bear the company logo and are supposed to go to valuable customers, but are often traded (see above). But how many expensive pens and stuffed animals or blinking stuff do you need?
The breakup day used to be very good, but most booth managers with some experience know better than to give away the stuff. For a medium to large booth the bill can be six figures and you want to use that expensive time to do what you came for and not fend of the vultures that sit around the booth for the better part of the last day waiting for the free stuff.
Shows are for communication. People from different companies that only talk over email and phone can meet face to face. You can check what the rivals are up to, what the market is doing. You can meet the customer and have a nice chat, finalize a deal or show some new stuff.
So why would I go there? Because I can meet the company. Where else would it be possible to talk to the actual engineers, ask what they are working on, or why a certain feature wasn't implemented. Just learn to differentiate between the sales staff and the engineers. Also shows are great for career developement. It has become so big that many companies are bringing in high level human resource staff. Best is to tell the companies that you are interested in that you will be at the show and send a resume beforehand.
i'm so tired of not being able to see this stuff cause the server went down. slashdot should start caching the page so everyone can read the article. i want to know how to get free stuff too. not that i don't already know how and do it regularly. it may be wrong but i found faked id badges for major tech firms and publications(sony, ms, wired, pc gamer, etc.) really rack up the stuff. i actually got a free 32in TV from sony after bsing with the guy in the booth for 30 minutes and convincing him i was a tech reviewer at cnet. yes its it lying and conniving but hey i like free stuff and karma is over hyped anyway.
WTF?
I went to this erotic show and all I got was a gimp tool kit...
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
But the final sentence above exposes the core of a problem that has always pissed me off about the service industry in the US.
rude or impatient clients would get f*9&% zilch from me.
For reasons that will ever remain mystical to me, much of service industry here has magically put the onus of enabling good service on the customer -- the customer must behave in such a way as to deserve good service. What the poster and most of the industry seem to forget, is that the customer has handed over hard earned money (or is about to), and is not endebted to the service provider or otherwise oweing something in return for good service. Indeed, the service provider is receiving a paycheck regardless of the customer's mood, and to provide the service is the job they elected to do. The very idea that the paying customer owes the bartender/waitress/whatever a smile/pat on the back/whatever to receive pleasant service is so backwards it boggles the mind -- perhaps said "grumpy" customers would be more pleasant if they knew the person behind the bar weren't sulky/petulant and/or interested in actually doing the job they had signed up for. I don't know what service industry workers would think were they to visit a country like Japan, but it would be an interesting experience for sure.
"How to have a million dollars...and never pay taxes.
"First, get a million dollars. Then, when the IRS..."
Before you say it, the subject line was designed to accurately reflect the fact that all such inquisitions are rife with corruption and hypocrisy.
The enemies of Democracy are
Official letterheads are no problem - what's that high-quality inkjet printer for, after all?
Week 1 you're a movie magazine, so contact all the movie studios, DVD distributors, etc.
Week 2 you're setting up a specialist magazine for the wine drinker. Or beer. Yep, make it beer. Do they have anything they may want to put your way? You can tell them how great the taste is (hic)
Week 3 (after sobering up) and you've finally worked out how to get a free subscription to every pr0n site on the net - you're writing an article which you'll be submitting to all the 'male lifestyle' mags. Give me subscription and you'll be sure to get a mention.
Week 4 (after mopping up) it's time to retire. Hell, you got movies, alcohol and porn for free. What else is there?!
Just go through every section in the Yellow Pages, and hit them with a similar story. If you take it far enough, you may get free tickets/flights to shows, presentations, press briefings, parties... even test drive the latest cars/boats/women if you can talk the talk.
Don't do this via email because it will just get discarded as spam. More importantly, and one anti-spam law suit will evaporate all the freebies you manage to grab. For the price of stamps and printing, the potential rewards are there for the taking. And you did say you were 'intending' to start that magazine/site didn't you... and on reflection changed your mind. On the other hand, if you start to get free movies, beer and porn, publish the damn thing and soak up the free gifts!
Watch my YouTube atheist video blog (user NickGisburne2000) for arguments against religion
Free pizza for life!? Where!
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
But.... flying disks aren't exactly fire resistant/retardent.
He might want to consider removing the foam disks and installing real insulation before he sells the place and an inspector has to come by.
I don't know much about fire codes, but I seriously doubt he's up to code.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
FYI
1. Give away information about how you got free stuff, and show off all the free stuff you got.
2. Next year, when you go, noone will be giving away free stuff. And not just to you, either.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
I've worked for companies in the past that always rigged their "business card in a bowl" drawings to only give good prizes to potential customers -- the rest of the entries got canned. I was told not to bother with most other booths giveaways, because they were all rigged as well.
After that, I always tried to act like a very interested customer, listened to a sales pitch, then gave my card to the salesguy to put in the bowl. Still didn't win anything (I guess I'm not a good enough actor).
Why do people seem to think it's any different in this context...?
Looks like the Techzone just learned how to get a free slashdotting. Is that bacon I smell?
Disclaimer: MINAA (Mummy! I'm Not An Animal!)
... that the ads on the website are the hardest hit?
"Women are just like ninjas; They lie even when it is more convenient to tell the truth." ~ Unknown
I checked the picture and read the "article". What we have is:
-Laptop backpaks. Those are really sweet, and they were being given to each and every member of the press (I got one) and no one else.
-PSP. As far as I can tell, they got those at a raffle or something like that, so I don't think it counts.
-1 Gig of memory. That's what, 80 bucks now?
Assorted trinkets, pens and crap. I don't think the lot of it goes for more than a hundred bucks.
And you call that loot? Get a free plasma or PC, then write an article. OK?
If you have a hand truck, you don't need no stinkin' badges!
You can get into many shows for free simply by pushing a hand truck into the loading dock service entrance. (And that makes it easy to leave with a lot of stuff, too!)
Once I got into a conference at Moscone that way, but it turned out I was in the wrong conference -- the right one was across the road in the other auditorium (through the underground tunnel). So I just pushed the hand truck out the exit of the wrong conference, down the tunnel, and straight into the front entrance of the right conference. They saw the hand truck, and waved me through the front entrance without any trouble!
-Don
Take a look and feel free: http://www.PieMenu.com
Excellent hack. What were you wearing?
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
For example, he showed up at a College of Engineering open house event for homecoming. While he was there, he got some free cookies. Then, he walked up to the stadium and parlayed said cookies into football tickets from some cute girl. Bam! Free football tickets!
Jeff goes to DAC (Design Automation Conference) in Anaheim. Conference admission is a couple hundred bucks. Dude comes back with close to $1000 in free stuff from the vendor show, including flash drives, MP3 players, etc.
College of Engineering career fair rolls around. I ask him to pick me up a highlighter while he's out because I'm reading papers. He comes back with no less than 20 of them. Oh yeah, he's also gotten laundry detergent for a couple of weeks, enough Easy Mac to feed him for a couple of weeks, more office supplies than the entire lab could use in a semester, and tons more stuff. He replaced the items on his bookshelf with the free booty from multiple trips.
We built a tower out of no less than 200 packs of bubble gum from a Wrigley's promotional stand.
Jeff walks around campus and records dates and times of free food flyers into his cell phone. Then, he goes back to his office and enters them into an Outlook calendar. The only time this guy pays for food is when I invite him out to eat with the rest of the group.
He says the key is to be completely shameless. I've seen him walk right up to the organizer of a booth and flat out ask him for a box of stuff. Then, after getting the box (much to my dismay), he'll turn around and ask for a box for his officemate. He'll walk right up to displays and dump the entire contents of the display into a bag. Most people are too polite to stop him, so he gets away with it.
There are two types of people: those prepared for the zombie apocalypse and those who will be eaten.
Dress up in regular work clothes. If the hand truck doesn't work, then try wearing one of these!
-Don
Take a look and feel free: http://www.PieMenu.com