Chick-fil-A Mooses a Super Value Opportunity

If you aren’t from the south, you may not have ever experienced eating at Chick-fil-A. The chain is well known for their chicken sandwiches and their usage of a cow as the company mascot. I prefer the chicken nuggets and lemonade to the chicken sandwich but do enjoy their “cow usage”.

Over the past few days, many of the coupon forums and sites have listed a promotion for a free Chick-fil-A 2010 calendar. It’s on Spoofee (deleted), Fatwallet (deleted), Coupon Saving Game and over 120 comments on SlickDeals. The calendar promotion is also listed on moms sites including KnoxMoms. There’s just one problem…the promotion is fake – was sent by someone outside Chick-fil-A.

When you click on the link to order the calendar, you are greeted with the image below and the following text, “Incorrect information has been circulating on the internet regarding the 2010 Chick-fil-A® Cow Calendar.  Chick-fil-A is not authorized to distribute free calendars nor to register those who log on to www.shopchick-fil-a.com.  Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience.”

While Chick-fil-A had nothing to do with the fake promotion, they lost an amazing opportunity to turn a negative experience into an amazing moo-ving experience. From my perspective, the message they provided above was fine – it’s the truth. But why not offer the users something? A simple coupon off their next purchase or a free ice-dream with a combo…something! At an absolute minimum, offer the customer an option to signup for future (real) offers and savings. I can only imagine the influx of traffic that the calendar webpage received over the past 24 hours – and instead of capturing and getting more customers in the store, they let the deal hunter go away empty-handed.

Chick-fil-A does such a great job normally with promotions and coupons. Their coupons never expire and you can use them anytime.

The reason I am sharing this story is because it could happen to you and your startup one day. Make sure you never let a potential customer, and more importantly a spokesperson for your company, walk away with nothing.

It’s not too late Chick-fil-A…the links will be out there forever so offer something to the customers and create a positive social media and customer experience.