RRRoll up the rim to lose

Win? I don't think so Tims

If you recall, I wrote an article about Tim Hortons in the January 23 issue of the Interrobang. I thought I’d take it one step further this week by writing about Tim Hortons’ annual Roll Up The Rim contest.

This year the contest began on February 20, so we’re a month into long lines of people buying coffee, drinking it down and then frantically rolling up the rim of the cup in the hopes of winning something.

I’ve tried my luck at this marketing campaign, and I haven’t been successful. One donut in five attempts is hardly a lucky streak. But what is it with this promotion that draws people towards it like magnets? I should add that I too joined this bandwagon, for I wouldn’t drink much coffee over the fall and winter because I just didn’t see myself queuing up for 20 minutes to buy coffee. I still don’t – the only time I really get coffee is when there is no line in front of the any of the Fanshawe outlets of Tim Hortons, which, as most of you know, is rare.

Nevertheless, I’ve seen people queue for what seems to be ages in front of the campus outlets in the hopes of buying a coffee and a donut to munch in class or while on break. This year, Tim Hortons offers prizes such as 40 Toyota Camry hybrid vehicles, 100 Panasonic 3D TV sets, 1,000 Coleman camping packages, 500 Panasonic digital cameras, 25,000 Tim Cards and 47 million food prizes. The prizes look good, and personally I’d love to win the car, but that’s where I realize there are several thousands more who want to do exactly the same.

While doing my research on this contest (since it’s all new to me,) I came across YouTube videos with people providing tutorials on how to roll up the rim. I thought, “Surely rolling up the rim of a coffee cup isn’t as hard as people make it out to be.” When I tried my hand at it myself, I failed miserably. Perhaps knowing how to roll up a rim is a big thing after all. In fact, there was an article in the Winnipeg Free Press dated March 11, 2007, about a man named Paul Kind. This then-62 year old did something that will leave Tim Hortons fans forever indebted: he invented the Rim Roller. For many people, the Rim Roller is a device that stands right up there with the greatest Canadian inventions of all time: insulin, the telephone, the lightbulb, the Canadarm, basketball, the dental mirror and more. For others, like Bonnie Mayer, who was featured in the Winnipeg Free Press article, the invention wasn’t required. “It’s amazing to me that someone would invent this ... someone has w-a-a-a-a-y too much time on their hands,” she said. I guess it was kind of expected that this idea, like many other ideas, would face its own criticism, but there’s no taking away anything from the potential such an invention has in today’s world.

Whatever the result of this contest, this marketing campaign that Tim Hortons puts out each spring is always going to be an exciting time for coffee drinkers. It’s quite a strange addiction (if that’s the right way to put it), but from what I understand, during this month of RRRoll Up The Rim, it’s always going to be a craze and it’s always going to be Canadian. 

Originally Written for the Interrobang:http://www.fsu.ca/interrobang_article.asp?storyID=8276&sectionID=2&issueID=200
Image Credit: http://farm1.static.flickr.com/186/419710136_93800e28bb.jpg
Video Credit:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56wWFUyL-IA

Tim's = Canada

It's Always Tim's Time...

"I'd like a large double-double, please!" These are the very same words that are repeated in thousands of places all across Canada each day, with almost no variation (except maybe a variation in the size of coffee ordered). I'm referring to coffee that is sold at Tim Hortons, an establishment so Canadian it was founded by a former hockey player Tim Horton back in 1964. In those days, they served just coffee and donuts, but today that very empire has expanded to thousands of stores all across North America serving far more than that.

It was the summer of 2008 and I had been on Canadian soil for little over 10 days. It was almost time to go back home to India, at which point my cousins reprimanded me for not stepping into a single Tim Hortons restaurant. Why the big fuss about something that seemed so minute was something I never quite figured out until I stepped into a franchise. Tim Hortons is as Canadian as hockey is, that is what I learned whilst sipping on my first-ever cup of Tim's coffee. Because Tim Hortons is so omnipresent all across Canada, it has grown to become a prominent feature in the life of a Canadian. I'm assuming this was one of the reasons why the franchise took the trouble of opening up an outlet in far-off Kandahar, Afghanistan, which was housed in a 40-foot trailer, giving Canadian troops stationed there a taste of home. The outlet closed down about four months after troops left Afghanistan, but not before serving four million cups of coffee and three million donuts (the figures I state here are according to an article published by the National Post dated November 24, 2011.)

"In so many ways, the story of Tim Hortons is the essential Canadian story," the late writer Pierre Berton once said. "It is a story of success and tragedy, of big dreams and small towns, of old-fashioned values and tough-fisted business, of hard work and of hockey." I will not disagree with Berton here, for I've been told by a couple of second- year students who are in my program that I must grow to love Tim Hortons coffee. Tim Hortons can have such an impact on people, and I have an anecdote which will enforce this point. My family was coming down to visit me in December because I couldn't go back home to India for Christmas. The last text message I received from my brother before he boarded the flight from Delhi Airport was a small but simple one: "I want iced cap!" That was it. This text came from a boy who'd spent just over 10 days in Canada and has grown to love the franchise just as much as people who've lived all their life in Canada.

I've never been the biggest fan of hot coffee or hot chocolate for that matter. I have, however, always loved a nice cup of cold coffee. The sub-zero winter conditions in Canada, however, have caused me to gradually get a bigger liking towards hot coffee. I'm sure it's no surprise that the three Tim Hortons locations on campus here at Fanshawe always have huge queues in from of them, no matter what time of day it may be. It just reinforces the fact that Tim Hortons was, is and will always be Canadian and proud.

I end with a phrase that is apt and one that I'm sure is at the tips of every Canadian person's tongue: "It's time for Tims."

Originally Written for the Interrobang: http://www.fsu.ca/interrobang_article.asp?storyID=7942&sectionID=2&issueID=193
Image Credit: http://media.mmgdailies.topscms.com/images/97/ca/224422bd4b13b91b14f6405d6a86.jpeg
Video Credit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuFLon26nMw