Two week ago, I wrote about those two motivational/inspirational all-day, celebrity-filled programs being offered in Atlanta one week apart. And I wondered how the heck they were funding them, given that they were advertising admission fees at $1.95 for one and $4.95 for the other. A little math suggested to me that, even if they sold every seat in the giant Philips Arena and Georgia Dome, they couldn't pay for the relentless spate of full-page ads in the AJC almost every day for weeks.
The full-page ads have continued almost daily, at least 5 times a week, touting the likes of Sarah Palin, Bill O'Reilly, Laura Bush, Bill Cosby, Colin Powell, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, and Rudi Giuliani as inspiring motivational speakers.
It still doesn't make sense. They must be spending hundreds of thousands of dollars just on these ads; then there is the rent for these two venues, and all those speakers fees and expenses.
I don't get it. What's the catch? Is there a story here? Do they lock people inside and make them buy 10 books apiece before they can go home? Is it a recruitment program to sell people expensive continuing motivational programs? Is there some sort of Ponzi scheme involved?
Not that it really matters in the scheme of things right now. But I've become increasingly curious, and the question has lodged in my brain like an annoying burr under the saddle.
Ralph
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If it's underwritten by the Koch Brothers, they don't need to charge admission.
ReplyDeleteAnd the Koch Brothers probably get a tax deduction for it.