Something for nothing

Honestly, you give people something for nothing and are they grateful? No, they just complain when you stop!

For the last year and more, we've been running a free-to-enter competition to win a gun - typically worth about £1000 - every month in the magazine. It helps promote the magazine and in modern marketing terms it's "added value" for the readers.

But the magazine is a business like any other, and we can't just keep giving away a free gun every month. Could your local gunshop afford to do that and stay in business? Neither can we.

So we had two options: ditch the competition altogether, or charge a nominal amount for entry - not to make a huge profit (fat chance!) but to offset some of the cost of the gun... before the managing director hauls me up in front of the board to explain why I'm throwing their money away!

And I thought, well, I'm sure readers would rather have the choice of entering if they want to. And if they don't want to spend a quid or two on an entry, no-one is forcing them.

Well, blow me if I don't get an earful from an irate reader accusing me of killing off the sport of shooting single-handed! And then another reader calls to accuse me of making obscene profits from a phone-in scam!

So listen up: if you don't want to enter, don't enter; if you do enter, I wish you the very best - but either way the sport of shooting will continue regardless, and I won't be retiring to the Bahamas on the proceeds!