The Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to cancer prevention and survivorship, isn’t the only Foundation using something you wear on your wrist to draw attention to its cause. The Until There’s a Cure Foundation has been raising funds and awareness about HIV/AIDS for a number of years now through the sale of what it calls The Bracelet.
Of course, unless you have been a sequestered juror for the last couple of months, you know that in the LAF’s case, we’re talking about those ubiquitous, thin, yellow rubber wristbands that have become almost de rigueur among young and old alike. As Lance himself wrote in a direct mail fundraising appeal I received last summer just days before he was crowned victor once more on the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, “Ultimately, we want five million people worldwide to wear LIVE STRONG yellow wristbands.”
Well, leave it to Lance to exceed expectations – at last count, 13 million of them have been sold.
So if only over half a million people have chosen so far to wear The Bracelet (according to an ad I saw the other day in Blender magazine), you might think Until’s numbers pale in comparison to the LAF’s. Uh, think again.
The Bracelet, described by the Foundation as “a simple yet elegant symbol reminiscent of the MIA/POW bracelets worn during the Vietnam era,” is decidedly more high-end than Lance’s wristband, and such high-profile celebrities as Mandy Moore, Tiffani Thiessen, Tony Hawk and Kevin Bacon are seen wearing it in glamorously photographed ads. The Bracelet comes in everything from copper ($15), to sterling silver ($75), to 14k gold ($400), while every one of Lance’s plain yellow wristbands are made out of synthetic silicone rubber and sell for the same low price: $1.
But I’m not here to compare the price or quality of this jewelry – nor how much money each Foundation is raising as a result of such innovative marketing efforts. Obviously, both are masterminding brilliant campaigns on behalf of wonderful, worthy causes.
No, I’m here to tell you that both the Lance Armstrong Foundation and the Until There’s a Cure Foundation are subscribing, whether they know it or not, to the theory behind “Free Prize Inside!”, Seth Godin‘s latest – and, arguably, greatest – book.
“A free prize isn’t a gimmick,” Seth says on the inside back cover. “It’s a game-changing soft innovation; a cool twist that doesn’t cost a fortune but that transforms the way people think about your product or service.”
“Generally, a free prize has two characteristics,” he says on page 19. “First, it’s the thing about your service, your product or your organization that’s worth remarking on, something worth seeking out and buying….Second, a free prize is not about what a person needs. Instead, it satisfies our wants. It is fashionable or fun or surprising or delightful or sad. It rarely delivers more of what we were buying in the first place. It delivers something extra.”
Fashion statements of a similar kind, both the yellow wristband and The Bracelet deliver “something extra.” Give to either cause and you get more than just a good feeling, you get an incredibly “cool twist” as a symbol of your support. You get, yes, a “free prize.” But what’s much more important is this: Because so many people are buying their products – and, in a show of solidarity, wearing them – both Foundations are raising more awareness and funds than they ever could have otherwise. All concerned benefit, most of all, those fighting cancer, HIV and AIDS.
Google+
Follow
