Question for you… If you were going to make money by stripping old cars for parts and selling said parts, how much time, money and effort would you put into obtaining those old vehicles?
Another question for you… When you have an old car that doesn’t work anymore, what do you do with it?
(Given that there’s no evidence being presented here that isn’t circumstantial, this post and the others like this are exercises in hypothesizing for entertainment purposes only, whether or not the accounts presented correspond to real, not-fictional events.)
This is a Google search, performed just now from my location in Burlington, Ontario, for the term, “auto wreckers”:
There’s Bodyline Auto Recyclers, coming up in the first position with a paid search ad. As someone with an old car that isn’t much good for driving, my attention might be grabbed by their suggestions like “We Pay Top Dollar” and “Get The Most Cash For Your Old Car!”
It would seem that a simple Google search reveals to me, as someone curious about what a search engine might turn up in the way of “auto wreckers,” that I can get money for my old car.
So, if I see these ads on television, what’s my response? Especially if I already know that you normally just take your car to the wrecker or the junkyard, and when I look it up online (via Google Search), I’m told, in words with extra capitalization, that I can get paid money for my old car?
That’s something to consider when looking at the cost of promoting Kars4Kids.
How much would that cost?
TV commercials do not get produced for free. Child actors, as far as I know, do not work for free. All-white sets do not happen by accident–someone has to pay to make it that way and light it so it has the right effect. And lights aren’t free, either. I’m not sure if TV commercial directors work for free, but if I were controlling the purse-strings, I’d probably err on the side of assuming I’d have to pay someone to direct this thing.
Let’s say the first ad cost $800,000 to produce and broadcast.
Let’s say the second ad cost $700,000 to produce and broadcast.
There’s also a Kars4Kids YouTube channel. It would appear that the Kars4Kids people also run some sort of “K4K Camp.” Let’s say that’s not a real camp, but a photo shoot to sell people on the idea that this charity benefits children by putting on some sort of summer camp program(s) for them, and say it cost about $8,000.
That YouTube channel has over 240 videos on it. Someone had to put those there. There’s a website, too, and those aren’t free. Let’s say the total promotion expenses were north of $1,700,000.
How much would that bring in?
Before I look at how much Kars4Kids attracted in charitable donations, I’m going to do a marketing-based thought exercise about what it is Kars4Kids is doing to raise money, apparently, you know, for kids.
You, the viewing public, are being called to take an action: to call the number on the screen, and donate your car to Kars4Kids.
Kars4Kids gets the car and sells the parts.
Off the top of my head, I can think two well-established business models for getting car parts to sell–to supply your car-parts-sales business:
- The first one, oddly, that comes to my mind, is that guys will steal cars and strip them for parts.
- The second one that came to my mind is the auto wrecker/junkyard industry.
- There is now a third one. You use the power of spending copious amounts of money on promotion to try to convince people to voluntarily not receive money for their old car, presumably because of the influential power of your creative.
How a potential donor might see it
Admittedly, I’m belabouring the point, but if you were to rationalize this process as a marketer, you’d have to think through these practical steps on behalf of your intended target:
- I’m watching television.
- The Kars4Kids ad comes on while I’m watching that thing I’m watching.
- I happen to be a guy or woman who has an old car that I need to get rid of.
- There’s the music, the kids playing the instruments and performing, and then they pitch me with the “charity/helping others” appeal: I can help kids (somewhere) by donating my old car.
- I’m going to call 1-877-KARS-4-KIDS (which isn’t even the right number of digits for a phone number; is that right? Is it actually just “1-877-KARS-4-KI”?) and they can tell me what I do next, presumably, to help out these kids,
- because that’s the benefit I would receive from taking this action,
- as a person who is incentivized, emotionally, to get a payoff from being a generous charity-giver-type person.
- because that’s the benefit I would receive from taking this action,
That’s a lot of language I just spewed to try to make a very simple point. And here it is: No one has any reason to donate their car to Kars4Kids, therefore Kars4Kids will receive zero old cars to sell for parts.
This isn’t known to very many people, most of whom have heard other things, but…
The actual results, in terms of response from the public, are five phone calls from people (kids) pulling pranks. Total revenue: $0.00.
My opinion, based on the analysis I just did:
Kars4Kids is a waste of money for the people doing it because it costs a lot of money and yields zero revenue in return.
You’d make more money running an auto wrecker’s yard or a stolen car ring. You’d lose less money doing absolutely nothing. Opportunity cost is an important concept to consider–other possible uses for your money. So is “Return on Investment,” or “ROI.”
That is a terrible business idea, and a terrible idea for a scam. The big victim here is K4K.
The public who has to see these commercials doesn’t feel anywhere near the kind of pain that someone who loses nearly two million dollars feels.
The trick’s on Kars4Kids.
(And Satan’s Choice Canada.)
