A trick upon Bicyclists

Manawatu Herald, 24 September 1898, Page 3

A trick upon Bicyclists

« — — _ — Says the Kapler Telegraph :— There Tpag once a '• snowball " &oQ.gQ, It waa worked by means of postage stamps. As it became to be pretty widely known before it petered oat there is no need to explain it. But it may be as well to note that an adaption of the trick is being worked in connection with bicycles. This is the way it is done. A firm announce that they will sell a first-class bicycle for four shillings, under certain conditions. The fun lies in the conditions. Verdant Green must first buy a coupon for four shillings. This is worth nothing, except the right to purchase ten other coupons. Then, when he has sold each of the latter ten coupons to ten different bttye'rsY and then when each of those tetf different buyers has purchased ten more coupons, and thus the firm have received the total sum of twenty two pounds four shillings, Verdent Green gets bis bicyck« And what have the ten buyers oMajS coupons each obtained ? Well, Hey hare the right to sell their coupooa: to others who wish to acquire tjra| right to purchase ten coupons frsl| the firm. Thus, by the time Mr yi G. gets his bike, the firm have in j addition to the price of it ten other , persona canvassing " all they know" i to induce a hundred other persons to buy forty shillings' worth oi coupons.] each, and when each of these hundred persons have sent for two pounds worth of coupons, and the firm have then a hundred canvassers working for them in the hope of somehow getting a bicycle, the ten original purchasers from Mr V. G. get their bicycles, which have been paid for by the simple fact of a hundred other persons having been induced to buy two pounds' worth of coupons, and so on indefinitely. The ingenuity of this new form of the " snowball " is undeniable, and as the population of New Zealand has its fair Garlylean proportion, we may conclude that the engineers of the scheme will make a lot of money before their little game is " up."