Comments on: Business And Bible Terms: “Free”

By: Online Scrabble

Online Scrabble — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 17:23:58 +0000

[...] Business and Bible Terms: Free at Bible Money Matters [...]

By: Corporate Barbarian Links: Chainsaw Massacre Edition « The Corporate Barbarian Blog

Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:13:29 +0000

[...] at Bible Money Matters tells us to beware of the term”free”. Someone ultimately has to pay the [...]

By: Weekly Round up 8-29-09

Weekly Round up 8-29-09 — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:03:37 +0000

[...] looks at the affects of “Free“ and what it really meansover at Bible Money [...]

By: meoip

meoip — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 22:33:46 +0000

I run a business Construction company which offers a service and work free to the consumer. The company did 5 million in business our first 18 months and opened 7 offices across the country. Of course in my case free to the consumer literally means the bill is passed onto someone else, the homeowner insurance company. It also means free isn’t really free it’s a provision of having and paying for homeowners insurance. Most consumers never write me a check, they pay their insurance company a premium and their insurance company pays me. A new roof, siding and gutters are free of charge because you subscribed to your insurance. If you pay into the plan you can get a $10,000+ of work done for no current lump some out of pocket cost. It’s like amazon prime or other subscriber based discount services.

By: Craig

Craig — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 22:19:31 +0000

@Corporate Barbarian. Thanks for the helpful illustration. Makes perfect sense.
@Paul. You are right that not everything has a catch. I appreciate your offering a free eBook. I’ll be sure to check it out.
@Jason R Fisher. Thanks for the example. Free does certainly make us spend more at times. That is the strategy. Companies don’t exist to give us good deals, but to make us spend more through great deals.
Craig´s last blog ..The Advantages of Credit Cards over Cash

By: Corporate Barbarian

Corporate Barbarian — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:52:12 +0000

Expenses are like a balloon. While pushing on one end may make it smaller, the other side expands because the same amount of air is still in the balloon. I used to calculate the overhead rates at one of my old companies. Every so often, there would be an edict to lower the overhead rate for the Engineering pool by reclassifying some expenses to another pool. We didn’t actually decrease the Engineering costs; all we were doing was pushing the cost around, just like in the balloon example. The costs don’t vanish. Someone ultimately has to pay for the expense.
Corporate Barbarian´s last blog ..8 Things that Will Get You Fired

By: Paul Williams @ Provident Planning

Paul Williams @ Provident Planning — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:10:33 +0000

Craig,

While I think your cautions against free might be true in many cases, you should note that not all free offers have some kind of hitch.

I’ve been offering a free ebook about contentment on my website for quite some time. I’m not even requiring people to subscribe. I feel that the message is so important that I’m willing to give it away as freely as possible with no hitches or anything that might cause someone to find an excuse not to download it.

I’ve not heard any comments about reservations in regards to downloading that free ebook, but I have had a couple people thank me for the work I did. I know it’s helped bring some people closer to God, and that’s worth more than anything to me.

Sometimes free is a really good thing.
Paul Williams @ Provident Planning´s last blog ..Make Money by Selling Your Stuff

By: ithomas

ithomas — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:50:59 +0000

Unfortunately, there is no free lunch in America. There’s always the little asterisk right next to the FREE* ;(
ithomas´s last blog ..Job Guarantee

By: Jason R Fisher

Jason R Fisher — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 13:46:04 +0000

I have more than once bought something else on Amazon to get the ‘free’ shipping. I read in “Predictably Irrational” that when they decided to use the free shipping model they saw dramatic increases in sales, everywhere but in France, where shipping was 1 franc (twenty cents). Since it wasn’t free it didn’t have the psychological effect that it did everywhere else. When they finally changed from one franc to free in France they saw the same sales increases.
Jason R Fisher´s last blog ..Conquering Christmas, Not Just Coping

By: Ray

Ray — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 13:15:18 +0000

I think when things come for free one should be careful, but not all free things are bad. Although 99% of the time when companies giveaway free items is a marketing campaign we can take advantage of them.

A few years ago a cable provider when into heavy marketing and offered me FREE PVR in exchange for my old receiver, after some thought I took the offer and its now been 6 years I have had FREE PVR which costs $30/mth plus taxes.

You just have to take a closer look but often free can work just great for consumers.

Of course I am talking about ethical free items and not stolen.
Ray´s last blog ..Compounding Interest: Best Investment Strategy -Invest Early