WITH ALL THE OBJECTIONS TO VETERANS selling poppies over the years in public places around Remembrance Day, the idea of a commemorative quarter seemed like an honest thing to do. Distributing them through Tim Horton’s didn’t appear to be a grand marketing ploy on their part, seeing as it’s an institute that’s just as recognized and perhaps more respected than, well, those other places. Besides the usual morning line-ups, when you’re slightly irritated before that first coffee of the day, was there really that great a spike in traffic during the promotion? It’s one thing to be a member of the opposition party, but really, do you honestly have to have an opposing view on everything? Good grief!
First, the Mint approached Tim’s, not the other way around. Second, everyone goes for coffee. A great deal of people, for whom time is too precious to be standing on line to be gouged on a monthly basis, myself included, may prefer to do their banking online or through an ATM, neither of which offer coinage. Third, the drive-thru at Tim’s moves quicker than at an ATM, even if the minivan ahead of you has ordered half a dozen toasted bagels.
Could distributing painted quarters under an untendered contract really be as bad as say, oh, I don’t know, unhinging the jaw in order to swallow up a political party without keeping everyone involded in the know and still call it something it hardly resembles? Dollars to donuts it’s not.