The Email Goes Out

To follow up on the awkward voicemail, here's the email... (many thanks to my copywriter!)

Dear La Quinta Marketing Team,

I’m writing with a simple, quirky barter proposal.

I realize you probably don’t receive or entertain many barter proposals, especially via email, but I figured we have nothing to lose.

You see, we’re big fans of LaQuinta.

So, I won’t be upset if you say no to this proposal or ignore this email. (I figure you probably have much more important things to tend to anyways).

That said, here’s the back story:

My husband Pete and I (and our dog, Roxy) are moving across country from New York to San Francisco on June 11th.

The other day, I was telling my friend Christina about our trip and she asked where we’ll be staying on the road. Would we be camping? Would we be staying in hotels?

I told her the truth: We’re staying in La Quintas all the way across the country.

In fact, I have literally planned our entire cross-country road trip based on the location of LaQuintas across I-80.

Why?

Because LaQuinta is clean, reasonably priced, you let dogs stay for free, and you have free coffee and breakfast.

When I told Christina this, she said “That’s awesome. You should live blog your trip – and I bet you could convince La Quinta to comp you free rooms for it.”

So, basically that’s the proposal:

I’ll live blog our adventure and share it with our hundreds of friends and family, stirring up some very favorable buzz and word-of-mouth.

In exchange, I’m asking for 5 free nights (June 11-15) as we drive across I-80 from New York to California.

So what do you think?

Sincerely,

Sam Kennedy

P.S. In the interest of full disclosure...

I’ve actually already started the blog here: http://laquintaroadtrip.blogspot.com/2011/05/idea.html

And I’ll definitely be live-blogging our adventure (and staying in La Quintas all the way) whether or not you decide to comp me, Pete and Roxy 5 free nights.

P.P.S. We’re not asking you to give us free rooms because we’re desperate and need the help. We just think it’d be kinda fun and very cool.

So let us know what you think!

We’ll assume that if you don’t respond you thought it was awesome too -- but you had to stay silent because
this deal would never get past the legal department...