Winning with raffles

Sept. 8, 2017
Mac Tools distributor J.D. Whittington encourages customer engagement and truck traffic by continually holding raffles and giveaways.

At any given time, Mac Tools distributor J.D. Whittington will have a raffle going on his truck.

He finds this has helped to encourage customer engagement and visits to the truck. But he says it’s also to give back to his customers.

The raffles generally require a payment to participate. 

“Most of my guys are $50 payments per week,” says Whittington, which is the typical amount required to receive a raffle ticket. “It'll push a lot of guys that were $20, $25, $30 (payments) a week, now they'll do $50.”

The current raffle running on the truck was a BINGO game giving away a Yeti cooler or a Traeger grill. Every $50 payment a customer makes, he or she receives a raffle ticket. In addition to having weekly raffles for smaller items like knives, hats and other apparel, for every six tickets acquired, a customer receives a bingo sheet. The customer keeps those existing tickets, marked by Whittington, so he or she can still participate in the weekly raffles as well.

Whittington confirms the BINGO game has provided the most engagement. He also says customers will readily pay more on their balance, and subsequently receive more raffle tickets, when he is giving away a firearm.

“Sometimes they go quick, sometimes they drag on,” Whittington says about raffles.

The raffles typically involve some kind of ticketing system, and Whittington makes sure not to include customer names on the tickets in the bin ready for drawings.

“Some guys think it's rigged,” Whittington says. “One of the guys I did training with said, ‘Don't ever put [customer] names on tickets.’ I don't want to play favorites. If you put names on [the ticket] and you get a customer you don't like or is not good, and you'll want to rig it. I don't care who wins. I don't want to know.”

There is a secondary reason not to include a customer’s name on the tickets: it encourages the customers to come out to the truck to check their tickets against the winning ones.

“If they want to know who won, either they have to have their buddy come out and take a picture of it, or they have to come out [to the truck], so this creates a ton of traffic,” Whittington says. “And the best shops are the shops you don't even have to walk into.”

About the Author

Erica Schueller | Editorial Director | Commercial Vehicle Group

Erica Schueller is the Editorial Director of the Endeavor Commercial Vehicle Group. The commercial vehicle group includes the following brands: American Trucker, Bulk Transporter, Fleet Maintenance, FleetOwner, Refrigerated Transporter, and Trailer/Body Builders brands.

An award-winning journalist, Schueller has reported and written about the vehicle maintenance and repair industry her entire career. She has received accolades for her reporting and editing in the commercial and automotive vehicle fields by the Truck Writers of North America (TWNA), the International Automotive Media Competition (IAMC), the Folio: Eddie & Ozzie Awards and the American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE) Azbee Awards.

Schueller has received recognition among her publishing industry peers as a recipient of the 2014 Folio Top Women in Media Rising Stars award, acknowledging her accomplishments of digital content management and assistance with improving the print and digital products in the Vehicle Repair Group. She was also named one Women in Trucking’s 2018 Top Women in Transportation to Watch.

She is an active member of a number of industry groups, including the American Trucking Associations' (ATA) Technology & Maintenance Council (TMC),  the Auto Care Association's Young Auto Care Networking Group, GenNext, and Women in Trucking.

In December 2018, Schueller graduated at the top of her class from the Waukesha County Technical College's 10-week professional truck driving program, earning her Class A commercial driver's license (CDL).  

She has worked in the vehicle repair and maintenance industry since 2008.

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