Fuel-Up Forever

Recently the United States Postal Service introduced a new "Forever Stamp." The stamp features an image of the Liberty Bell, and once purchased the stamp is valid for mailing a one ounce letter via First-Class postage forever -- regardless of future rate increases.

There's no denying that niggling postage hikes tends to result in stamps that have a row of 1-cent stamps to make up for the value of the left-over stamps we didn't want to waste, and sometimes even the return of the letter because it didn't have enough postage to make it to the addressed destination (although somehow tere's always enough postage for it to make its way BACK to the sender.)

This concept started me thinking about other items that could be purchased at a flat rate in advance in order to avoide future rate hikes. The first (and most obvious) item that popped in my mind was gasoline.

Why doesn't BP or Speedway or Marathon or whomever issue a "Fuel-Up Forever" card? It would function similar to a gift card that allows for "recharging" with new amounts once the pre-paid amount has dwindled, but instead of being worth 'dollars" it would be worth "gallons" -- just as the Forever Stamp isn't worth 'pennies,' it's worth 'one First-Class mailing.'

I wouldn't expect the card prices to remain static, but that they rise and fall with the current price of fuel. For example: this week I buy a card worth 50-gallons at a rate of $2.65/gallon, but next week when gas prices rise to $2.75/gallon my card is still worth 50-gallons no matter the current price. Users would basically be buying gas at current prices, betting they'd be increased soon (which is an extremely safe bet these days.)

Like the stamp, perhaps there is a small add-on cost to utilize this pre-paid offer. Currently, the First-Class postage rate is 39-cents, but the "Forever Stamps" cost 41-cents. In theory, a wily 'investor' might stock up on these gas cards and postage stamps today, but pay cash for the lower current prices until the rates were hiked to a point where it made sense to use the gallons/mailings on prices that exceeded the amount at which they purchased the "Forever" items.

I'm not presuming the idea of a "Fuel-Up Forever" card is perfect, but even as an element in a promotional campaign, it's certainly worth consideration.

Your Project Is Not Good Enough

You may be familiar with the Threadless.com website, but do you know anything in regard to the guiding principles that drive its leaders?

Here's what I knew about the website: Threadless.com is a t-shirt website that accepts designs from the public, and then takes votes on each accepted submission, allowing their community to decide which designs actually get printed and which artists are awarded cash prizes for their efforts. Each winning design is printed in a limited run and then added to the website for purchase.

Here's what I knew about Threadless.com's philosophy: Nothing. My mind was as blank as a plain white 100% cotton t-shirt.

Through random linkage I stumbled across a site (www.apieceofshirt.com) that featured a 45-minute video of Threadless.com honchos Jake Nickell and Jeffrey Kalmikoff speaking to the Community Next Conference at Stanford University. The title of their presentation was "The Patent-Pending skinnyCorp Method for Creating Online Awesomeness and Other Stuff."



I was most impressed by what appears to be their company mantra:

"Your Project Is Not Good Enough."

It's not meant as a demeaning or critical statement -- it's simply the guiding idea that no project should be considered 100% complete. Concepts can (and should!) always be improved upon.

The garment gurus also provided Four Commandments to make money the "awesome way" on the internet. Although they only had four, they assured the audience that in order to compete with Moses' original ten-count, that theirs were 2.5 times more important.

• Commandment #1
  Allow your content to be created by the community.
  .
• Commandment #2
  Put your project in the hands of the community.
  .
• Commandment #3
  Let your community grow itself.
  .
• Commandment #4
  Reward the community that makes your project possible.

I also spotted the video below of an appearance by the guys on WTTW in Chicago. Although tv host is a little annoying (it seems like he could have done at least a "little" more research on his guests before they showed up in his studio -- and could have pointed out 3 or 4 more times that they dropped out of college. Geez.) the guys do manage to provide some additional insights within the short bit of coverage, as well as share an interesting comment that came from one of the Stanford grads in the presentation mentioned above.



I always thought Threadless.com was a cool and creative t-shirt company -- but now I know it's simply a cool and creative company (whether they sell t-shirts or not.)