Alex Bogusky with the bike developed for Denver bike sharing

This is the conference where:

• You have to wait in line 40 minutes to get the badge you preregistered for, thereby missing the introductory orientation session.
• The volunteer who gives you the bag and conference program advises you not to take the program because you’ll probably lose it and they’ll charge $42 for a replacement; instead, you should come back at the end of the conference.
• The management warns that you are not likely to get into many of the sessions you want so you should enjoy the sessions you do attend, which was called a zen approach.
• Sessions may or may not have anything to do with the writeup in the program that brought you into the room. Which I guess is appropriate since you don’t know what you are going to end up attending.
• Your iPhone doesn’t work for outgoing calls because there are too many people with iPhones. But wait, they have great wireless so you can use Skype.

As I write this I’m watching Alex Bogusky of Crispin Porter Bogusky, people responsible for Burger King, Mini and some other ads you probably really like. (Incidental advertising fun fact he shared about Burger King: in a day there are more impressions for the printing on the side of a cup of fries than two Super Bowls… so now instead of a BK logo [pointless, since people already know they are in a BK] the fry containers have a little story.]

His preso is titled “Plan B: Can an Ad Guy Bring Bike Sharing to America?” But in fact he warned it was not about that at all but rather a quick pitch for his agency followed by a serious talk about climate change. New info, channeling Al Gore: this summer, it rained for the first time in Antarctica.

But wait: now he does bring in bike sharing at the end. And a nicely designed pilot program his agency, Trek and Humana are doing where an advertiser can sponsor bike sharing and bike rack and cute logos on special Trek bikes for $1.2 million per year in a large city and get ad impressions for far less than a billboard or bus shelter.) The bikes are very cool, adjustable for people from 5 feet to 6 foot four with a nice aluminum basket for your stuff. I want one. Oh wait, that’s not the idea.

Give 1 Get 1 billboard

I find this disturbing:  The One Laptop Per Child foundation repeated its “Give One Get One” program from 2007, apparently fixed all the problems from the year before (namely, virtually no promotion other than word of mouth and abysmal fulfillment/customer service)… and saw its sales drop by 93%.

This in spite of a mainstream ad campaign (including outdoor and television) and presumably seamless fulfillment through amazon.com.

The idea of this program is that you purchase two of OLPC’s mini-laptops and one is sent to a kid in a developing country and the other sent to you, allowing you to putz around and explore this approach to improving the world through technology. We did 2 G1G1s last year and it was a worthwhile experience.

But now, explaining the sales implosion, Nicolas Negroponte, the MIT professor who founded OLPC, told the Boston Globe “we’re not the newest game in town… the novelty has worn off.” Really? I would guess that the 2008 campaign reached millions of qualified donors who never even heard of the concept until now.

A better explanation is probably the economy. Most donation-supported organizations are having a tough year, and maybe the people who were most likely to be fascinated enough by the G1G1 concept turned out to be exactly those least able to afford $400 to participate.

But still… a 93% sales fall-off in spite of a marketing campaign that appeared to do everything right. For those of us who live and die by results, that’s a bunch of cold water in the face.