Special Offer of the month - how did it originate?

by truthseeker 6 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  truthseeker

  First of all, maybe the question should be, 'Why do we need a special offer of the month?'

  Every other week, I get a Macy's catalog with their special offer of the month, the Society is no different. If this is supposed to be truth, you should not need to have any special offer of the month. Why don't they just stick to their Bibles?

  Does anyone know how this got started, any of you long timers?

  Typical KM Announcements

  October - Awake and Watchtower magazines

  November - Any book published prior to 1988, if you do not have any in stock, please check to see if a local congregation has any.

  December - Liveforever Book - you know, the book with the 1914 Generation in and the Soddom and Gomorrah resurrection yes/no article.

  why are they STILL offering old light? All books published prior to 1988 have old light in.

  Why would they still offer an old study book with old doctrine in?

  Did any of you bother giving the Special Offer of the month?

  Doesn't this sound like one of those Best Buy magazines?
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  stillajwexelder

  Because they are a book/magazine publishing corporation --think of the tracts as little advertising leaflets and they need to move those books -- so when stock gets high of a particular item they need to move it faster -- so they have a special offer of the month with extra advertising in the Kingdom Ministry -- if you just view them as what they are A Book/magazine publishing/selling organization -- eveything makes sense and they are just like any other corporation.
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  truthseeker

  excellent viewpoint exjw, thank you.

  i never bothered with special offer of the month - for the most part, none of the householders had any idea that we were doing this!
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  mizpah

  It always puzzled me when I was a JW that the Society would encourage placement of old books that had old "light" by their "special offers."

  Now, I can see it was just a good business practice to clean the shelves of old merchandise to make place for the new...and make a little money out of it.
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  Gordy

  I was Literature Servant for 5 years. Every so often the offer would be, get rid of, sorry, I mean offer books published before a certain date. Used to think myself why offer something to someone, then have to explain that a teaching had changed. But as already stated good business practice, get rid of old stock, before replacing with new.
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  RunningMan

  Why do stores have sales? To generate interest, get people in the door, and sell them stuff.

  Why does the Society have special offers? To generate interest, get people in the door, and sell them stuff.

  They are simply featuring a product. It is a common sales tool.
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  rocketman

  I always figured that they did it because they neded to move stock.

  As far as various offers, yes, why indeed not just use the Bible? Why the need to have Service Meetings every week, wherein new presentations are constantly demonstrated and used, which left me with the frustration of not being adept at any one or two things to say. It's a consant little hamster wheel, turning just to keep jws busy.