Dave
Padilla Lanceros, yum yum!!
This was touched upon in a thread somewhere. Free stuff, free hats, free ashtrays, free free free. Free is good. Free food always tastes better, free drinks always hit the spot. A free car sucks because taxes will always follow. Free for the most part is good and all, however, I hate free stuff on a whole.
There was a Herf organized and well planned out a while ago. Well, actually many herfs were well organized and well planned out, but a lot of the major ones come with free stuff.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciate free stuff. It builds memories, allows me to try new products I would never thought of trying or even know it existed. I can look back at my numerous hats and say "Yeah, I was there, was a great time. I could live in that moment forever." Well, maybe until the next herf is organized. On another side, if someone has a product they want to get out there, samples ARE an efficient way of putting it out there, so from a Vendor's point of view, I can understand promoting these events. Got a new cutter or new humidification device to be known? Free stuff is definitely a way to get the word of mouth spreading. New cigar to the US shores that is only sold on the outskirts of Communist North Korea? Free stuff is it.
I can almost imagine the flaming PMs now. "Dave, if you hate free stuff, then give it to me you ungrateful $%#@^&." It's not really the free stuff I hate, it's the quality of the people I meet who only come for the free stuff then leave. These organizers bust their butt putting something great together, companies spend money from their own pocket to spread their wealth and gratuity, and then the vultures come in to "snag the swag" then bolt out the door.
Sure, maybe two or three of them actually have legitimate reasons to leave, but that's like two or three for every forty people. You know who you are!!! The ones that stay after all the free stuff is gone, those are the degenerates, but they are top notch in my mind. We want you to stay as well. Face to face time is very important to me, especially if everyone comes from all over, bringing with them their personalities, knowledge, charisma, whatever. The real party begins after the raffles, the door prizes, the auctions. We mingle, converse, develop mutually and together form a platonic bond as brothers and sisters. Cigars is one of the few things that can bring people across myriad backgrounds together. Someone said to me "At a Star Wars convention, everyone there is a nerd." It's true, there its a homogeneous gathering of bodies. At a herf, we all like cigars, but not everyone is an athlete, a fisherman, a computer geek, a sports fanatic, a teddy bear collector (I won't point any fingers).
Of course this is not a be all end all hypocritical rant of what the free stuff brings and I'm not out to alienate anyone or to change your thoughts about other people, but maybe just a reminder of why we get together at such big events seeing as how some of us have lost track about what smoking a cigar with fellow addicts really means. Maybe we should be more discrete with some of the free stuff.
Any other thoughts on this?
There was a Herf organized and well planned out a while ago. Well, actually many herfs were well organized and well planned out, but a lot of the major ones come with free stuff.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciate free stuff. It builds memories, allows me to try new products I would never thought of trying or even know it existed. I can look back at my numerous hats and say "Yeah, I was there, was a great time. I could live in that moment forever." Well, maybe until the next herf is organized. On another side, if someone has a product they want to get out there, samples ARE an efficient way of putting it out there, so from a Vendor's point of view, I can understand promoting these events. Got a new cutter or new humidification device to be known? Free stuff is definitely a way to get the word of mouth spreading. New cigar to the US shores that is only sold on the outskirts of Communist North Korea? Free stuff is it.
I can almost imagine the flaming PMs now. "Dave, if you hate free stuff, then give it to me you ungrateful $%#@^&." It's not really the free stuff I hate, it's the quality of the people I meet who only come for the free stuff then leave. These organizers bust their butt putting something great together, companies spend money from their own pocket to spread their wealth and gratuity, and then the vultures come in to "snag the swag" then bolt out the door.
Sure, maybe two or three of them actually have legitimate reasons to leave, but that's like two or three for every forty people. You know who you are!!! The ones that stay after all the free stuff is gone, those are the degenerates, but they are top notch in my mind. We want you to stay as well. Face to face time is very important to me, especially if everyone comes from all over, bringing with them their personalities, knowledge, charisma, whatever. The real party begins after the raffles, the door prizes, the auctions. We mingle, converse, develop mutually and together form a platonic bond as brothers and sisters. Cigars is one of the few things that can bring people across myriad backgrounds together. Someone said to me "At a Star Wars convention, everyone there is a nerd." It's true, there its a homogeneous gathering of bodies. At a herf, we all like cigars, but not everyone is an athlete, a fisherman, a computer geek, a sports fanatic, a teddy bear collector (I won't point any fingers).
Of course this is not a be all end all hypocritical rant of what the free stuff brings and I'm not out to alienate anyone or to change your thoughts about other people, but maybe just a reminder of why we get together at such big events seeing as how some of us have lost track about what smoking a cigar with fellow addicts really means. Maybe we should be more discrete with some of the free stuff.
Any other thoughts on this?
