A couple of days ago a notice went up in the depot explaining that on certain routes a return ticket would cost the same as a single for a limited period. Sounds like good marketing you may think. Oh No! Why? The only people to be told of this promotional offer appear to be the drivers. Today I drove one of the routes on which the offer applies and from the first to last request for a return ticket the customer asked me to clarify the price. “That’s a single price, I asked for a return”. “No, it’s more than that” etc. (What an honest lot of customers we have!). I then explained to them that this was a promotional price for a limited period. Other drivers have told me that on overhearing this buyers of weekly tickets said that they wouldn’t be buying a weekly again while returns were the same price as singles.

The good news is that this ‘promotion’ is not upsetting regular passengers but neither is it making them think I ‘must use the bus more’ or ‘bus travel is really easier than I thought’. These people are the already converted, they know the price and have the money in their hand to pay it. They are there because they know the bus is easy, convenient and good value. Stagecoach are giving away money to the converted!

If this promotion were aimed at encouraging people who don’t regularly use a bus to give it a go I’d be all in favour of it. But Stagecoach seem to want to keep it secret. The obvious place to see it promoted would be on the website I thought so I went to the Stagecoach website for our area. As you’ll see there is link ‘….click here for special offers …’. Click on the link and there’s not a mention of the return for a price of a single.

I’ve done lots of Google searches using every combination of words relevant to this and can’t find this promotion anywhere. Either no press releases had been issued, or they’ve not been picked up on. No one I know has seen any advertising of this promotion.

Today I probably ‘ collected £20 less than I would have if the normal fare had been charged on returns. Multiply that by however long this ‘giveaway’ lasts and the number of drivers on affected routes and the money soon mounts up. This is wasted money which could have spent on real marketing ….. or a Christmas bonus for drivers ;-) The only explanation I can think of for just giving the money away is that as the year nears its end the marketing budget is underspent and if it’s not all used they’ll get less next year! No time to plan the marketing of the promotion, just run it and use up the money!