December 2, 2006
more thresher craziness
Oops. The Thresher virus hits The Daily Mirror, one of the large British tabloids.
Off licence chain Thresher is bracing itself for a financial disaster after its “limited” 40 per cent discount of fer went worldwide on the internet.
This is mainstream now. Heh.
[UPDATE:] The story gets the full page three of the Times [paper version]. Here’s the online version.
Staff at some stores are having to work up to four hours’ overtime to cope with demand. At the country’s smallest Threshers shop staff were struggling to cope with the demand yesterday. “It’s been a shock to the system, that’s for sure,” Oliver Fowler said at the off-licence in the City of London. “We’ve hardly had time to stock the shelves and the phones have hardly stopped ringing with people asking if the offer is for real.
“Champagne was particularly popular and the store has taken more than a hundred vouchers in the past two days.”
You can even download the coupon directly off The Times’ home page, at least you can today. Too funny.
[UPDATE:] Ah. It made The Daily Telegraph as well. Intense.
Yesterday I was walking down the street, and I ran into an acquaintance of mine, somebody who I don’t know particularly well. I told him about the coupon. He said he had already received about 10 coupons from different people e-mailing him. Too weird.
[NEWBIES:] Read the original story here.
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Hmmm… BBC, Daily Mirror – and now Murdoch. This morning’s Times Online home page has a direct link to a coupon.
LOVE it Hugh!
Yes I agree with you, Threshers are mainstream now.
I think there was always a market for them, because people like to feel to get something very cheap.
Thank you for sharing this story with me !
I have no idea about the mark up involved in wine and champagne…but is it financial disaster (as it says in the article) or the single best piece of marketing/advertising in the history of the company? As long as they are not selling all inventory at less than cost, they are getting one heck of a lot of attention and bringing thousands of new customers into the stores and are now known internationally.
heh heh – this just keeps getting better. I was just in Sainsbury’s and there was an announcement about special wine offers for this weekend only. hurry hurry. I think those pants have been thoroughly kicked. Rock On, Mr Disruptor!
What I’m finding interesting is all the speculation about how much profits will be hit by this. If we take the line that Threshers aren’t sure about how much of a hit they’ll take at face-value, then presumably there’s quite a variation in margin between different types of wine and the overall average is somewhere just below 40%.
Or do you know different?
Well Lloyd, I cannot possibly comment on the margins
Reminds me of an old Radio Ad Sales exec story.
Client says he doesn’t believe radio advertising works
Salesman says – okay – I’ll run one free ad on my radio station that says tomorrow morning at 10 am you’ll give $100 to everyone that shows up at your store.
Hi Hugh,
What a story! One of your Windhoek cartoons was even shown in Newsnight on Friday or Thursday night! Great: conquering the planet!
I think Threshers may have been quite crafty. A world wide glut of wine exists.
Threshers offer 3 for 2 on most wines anyway. So normally they offer a 33% discount. For an extra 7% they are having their stock cleared for them. They could end up making massive profits on the volume as most people seem to be rushing there to snap up the bargains.