Boxing Day Baby Gets Presents Shock
Being a Boxing Day baby and aged 33 (almost) and oh still single, birthday and Christmas presents are always thin on the ground.
As a child I’d be disappointed to find that I’d get a small Christmas Day present as it was my birthday the day after. Then the day after disappointed to find, that the present I received the day previous was a joint Christmas and birthday present.
So I’ve been very pleased to receive gifts worth over £500 £750 throughout the month of December 2007 alone. Some of them are genuine Christmas presents, others have been won in prize draws whilst some have been awarded as sales incentives.
Here I take a look back at what Santa’s helpers have delivered since 1st December ….
HOTEL CHOCOLAT – ADVENT CALENDAR
Technically this gift arrived in November but as it wouldn’t fit through the letter box I had to arrange re-delivery at the weekend. So on 1st December I opened the recognisable box to find a nice advent calendar from Hotel Chocolat. How appropriate a day.
DIRECT WINES – 12 BOTTLES OF WINE
At the end of November, Steven from buy.at let me know I won an incentive for “biggest increase in sales last week compared to previous week” for Sunday Times Wine.
“We’ll be sending you the Christmas Collection of 12 bottles of wine.”
So I got the large box, which I think contains 11 wines and 1 champagne to my parents during the first week of December as I’ll be spending most of the festive period there.
TOTALLYSHOES – PAIR OF SHOES OF MY CHOICE
On 27th November I entered a Totally Shoes ‘Just For Fun’ competition that I spotted on the A4uForum. On the 5th, Brian Edwards announced:
“Congratulations to Ray Theakston of www.ShopCodes.co.uk who won TotallyShoes’ first just for fun competition by knowing that Chuck Taylor was a basketball player and is associated with the brand Converse.
He has selected a pair of Skecher’s Citywalk Footpath shoes.”
The second most expensive pair of shoes they had available were delivered to my works address by the next morning.
SLENDERTONE – SLENDERTONE SYSTEM
On the 11th Steven, from Affiliate Future, let me know that I’d won the latest Slendertone System, worth £120 for the “most improved affiliate in November”.
This is a great prize for me as January will be the month I try to shake off the chocolates and wine of Christmas, with the least amount of effort.
LEGO – £100 WORTH OF LEGO
On the 12th December, Mumtaz of LinkShare, announced that I was one of two LEGO November competition winners. I won £100 worth of LEGO for having the biggest percentage order increase during October.
I selected some Princess’ Palace LEGO for my two nieces.
WEBGAINS – VIRGINIA HAYWARD FESTIVE TRAY
On Wednesday morning I woke to the postman delivering a Virginia Hayward Festive Tray from the Webgains team. This was opened and shared during a poker game that same evening.
JACKPOTJOY – VINTAGE CHAMPAGNE
As each day and night of last week were merging into one with all the Christmas parties, I woke up late one day to see a box delivered by Jasper and Claire from Jackpotjoy. It contained a vintage bottle of Champagne.
It was a simple thanks for promoting them during 2007.
I now seem to have a little collection of champagne bottles going. Just need something to celebrate 
FLEUROP – £75 DELUXE CHOCOLATE HAMPER
Today I received an email from Andy at LinkShare, saying I’d won the Fleurop Advent Calendar prize.
All I had to do was generate 1 click between 12th-14th December for Fleurop-Interflora to be entered into the prize draw.
“We picked you randomly out of the hat!!” was the good news and now a £75 deluxe chocolate hamper is being delivered to my parents house.
So my thanks go to the above companies and those that have sent me cards.
Merry Christmas!
ADDENDUM:
VIRGINIA HAYWARD – CASE OF WINE
No sooner had the dust settled on this blog post, I received an email from Alex at Virginia Hayward, informing me that I’ve won a ‘case of wine in one of the affiliate incentive competitions this year.’
Guess I don’t need to go out in January now with all the booze I’ve won!
R.O.EYE – BOTTLE OF WINE
The delivery man left a note that there was a parcel ‘behind the grey bin’. I ran out panicking, thinking ‘Got a green bin and a black bin but not a grey one’. There, out in the cold was a package from Virgin Wines. Inside was a nice wooden box containing a nice bottle of Rioja.
AFFILIATE FUTURE – POKER CHIPS
On Christmas Eve morning I delayed going to work as I waited for re-delivery of a “large parcel too large for the letterbox.” I assumed it would be just another bottle of wine to add to my collection of 30. In fact it was a poker table mat with some chips. Very different. Affiliate Future is a network I do very little on but now that I am clued up to their merchants promotional codes, I plan to do more business in 2008.
AFFILIATE WINDOW/ 24 STUDIO – 4GB iPOD NANO
Save the best until last? I cut my Christmas dinner short to log into Affiliate Window towards the end of the Queen’s Speach. Then, with 8 incentive coins I clicked on the gift box, changed my delivery address and won a 4GB iPod Nano!
So my total gifts won or received during December are valued at well over £850. “Well done Ray,” as one of my friends would say.
