The Hero
الأســــــــــــــطورة
- إنضم
- Jun 29, 2008
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- 69
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- في ضحكة عيون حبيبي
For anyone yearning for a life lived in fresh air and open spaces, among cattle or combine harvesters, it must have seemed like the perfect opportunity.
The chance to escape the rat race and live the good life was on offer in the win a farm competition run by the countrys biggest fresh soup brand.
The winner would collect a cheque for £500,000 enough to buy a small farm on which to turn their rural dream into reality.
Damp squib: Nobody came forward to claim the New Covent Garden Soup Company's £500,000 Win A Farm Competition prize
More than 260,000 took part in the competition, part of a £2.5million marketing campaign by the New Covent Soup company and its sister brand, Farmhouse Fare.
However, the group has provoked a furious backlash from its Middle Britain customers after it announced that no one had won the top prize.
Each carton of soup or pudding pack carried a unique code number which customers had to enter on the win a farm website to see if they qualified for a prize.
But it seems that whoever had the winning number threw their food packaging away without checking.
The companys Facebook page and other consumer websites have been inundated with complaints.
One angry customer wrote: Well thats not fair . . . it should have been a straightforward draw.
Wheres the winning code then? You are in the soup on this promo. Another said: Trading standards should be informed.
Anyone can say that they are giving a decent prize away and then claim that no one was lucky enough to win it. Disgusting.
A third said: You can stick this imaginary farm where the sun dont shine! Ill grow me own turnips.
Customer Freddie Baker said he is considering making a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority.
This looks to me like a great example of corporate greed, he said. I saw it advertised and on packs of soup and thought it was just an amazing prize. However, I now feel it was a total scam.
How can you run a competition to win a farm and then say, Oh sorry, no one has won. Thank you very much and good night?
Apart from the £500,000 top prize, customers had a chance to win one of 50 pairs of designer wellies.
When the promotion was announced in October, the soup firms marketing director, Nigel Parrott, said: This competition is simply unique, and we expect it to attract huge numbers of new consumers to both brands.
A competition which offers them the chance to escape to the country, changing their lives entirely in an instant, is guaranteed to generate great excitement.
Debacle: Furious customers took to the internet to vent their anger after the company revealed the winner had not come forward
Subsequently, however, the company wrote on its Facebook page: Unfortunately, no one was lucky enough to win themselves a farm this time round.
Mr Parrott said: We appreciate that people are disappointed that the win a farm prize wasnt won, he said. We are just as disappointed and we take the feelings and comments of our customers very seriously.
We had 267,000 entries to the competition. Had all packs been entered, someone would definitely have won.
We are now reviewing how future promotions should be run and are taking these comments into consideration.
The company behind the promotion is Daniels Chilled Foods, based in Leeds. The controversy coincided with a takeover by the American food giant, Hain Celestial.
The competition was vetted in advance by the Institute of Promotional Marketing. Chief executive Annie Swift said: There was nothing wrong with the terms and conditions. It was legal and it followed the rules which cover promotions like this.
The chance to escape the rat race and live the good life was on offer in the win a farm competition run by the countrys biggest fresh soup brand.
The winner would collect a cheque for £500,000 enough to buy a small farm on which to turn their rural dream into reality.
Damp squib: Nobody came forward to claim the New Covent Garden Soup Company's £500,000 Win A Farm Competition prize
More than 260,000 took part in the competition, part of a £2.5million marketing campaign by the New Covent Soup company and its sister brand, Farmhouse Fare.
However, the group has provoked a furious backlash from its Middle Britain customers after it announced that no one had won the top prize.
Each carton of soup or pudding pack carried a unique code number which customers had to enter on the win a farm website to see if they qualified for a prize.
But it seems that whoever had the winning number threw their food packaging away without checking.
The companys Facebook page and other consumer websites have been inundated with complaints.
One angry customer wrote: Well thats not fair . . . it should have been a straightforward draw.
Wheres the winning code then? You are in the soup on this promo. Another said: Trading standards should be informed.
Anyone can say that they are giving a decent prize away and then claim that no one was lucky enough to win it. Disgusting.
A third said: You can stick this imaginary farm where the sun dont shine! Ill grow me own turnips.
Customer Freddie Baker said he is considering making a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority.
This looks to me like a great example of corporate greed, he said. I saw it advertised and on packs of soup and thought it was just an amazing prize. However, I now feel it was a total scam.
How can you run a competition to win a farm and then say, Oh sorry, no one has won. Thank you very much and good night?
Apart from the £500,000 top prize, customers had a chance to win one of 50 pairs of designer wellies.
When the promotion was announced in October, the soup firms marketing director, Nigel Parrott, said: This competition is simply unique, and we expect it to attract huge numbers of new consumers to both brands.
A competition which offers them the chance to escape to the country, changing their lives entirely in an instant, is guaranteed to generate great excitement.
Debacle: Furious customers took to the internet to vent their anger after the company revealed the winner had not come forward
Subsequently, however, the company wrote on its Facebook page: Unfortunately, no one was lucky enough to win themselves a farm this time round.
Mr Parrott said: We appreciate that people are disappointed that the win a farm prize wasnt won, he said. We are just as disappointed and we take the feelings and comments of our customers very seriously.
We had 267,000 entries to the competition. Had all packs been entered, someone would definitely have won.
We are now reviewing how future promotions should be run and are taking these comments into consideration.
The company behind the promotion is Daniels Chilled Foods, based in Leeds. The controversy coincided with a takeover by the American food giant, Hain Celestial.
The competition was vetted in advance by the Institute of Promotional Marketing. Chief executive Annie Swift said: There was nothing wrong with the terms and conditions. It was legal and it followed the rules which cover promotions like this.