Coffee trip

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Sales event (mattress sale) during a coffee trip to the Prickingshof (2013)

Coffee trip (also: advertising trip ) is the euphemistically disguised name for an organized day trip with a coach or ship with an attached sales event .

General

Participants are typically retirees who take advantage of the offer of an apparently inexpensive excursion with coffee and cake (hence the name) or lunch as well as sometimes actual or supposed gifts or prizes for the participants. The real purpose for the organizer, however, is to hold a sales event at which overpriced and / or unusable products are often sold.

Legal issues

The coffee trip represents an “external doorstep selling ”. The consumer can make use of his right of withdrawal and should, if necessary, consult a consumer advice center. If the fellow traveler is in fact forced to participate in the sales event or to buy, the criminal offense of coercion could be fulfilled. Civil law and competition law deal with coffee trips .

Profit commitments

Usually, coffee trips are advertised by sending out "invitations" addressed by name by post. In order to win a sufficient number of participants for the trips, dubious organizers often use unfair, sometimes criminal methods when making the invitations . The invitations are often disguised as profit announcements. For example, it is untruthfully alleged that the recipient of the letter won a large amount of cash, which is paid out when participating in the excursion, which is not the case. It is true that such profit notifications are in Germany as profit commitment i. S. d. § 661a BGB enforceable, the enforcement of claims often fails due to the lack of solvency of the company. An entrepreneur who sends such profit promises or comparable notifications to consumers and who creates the impression that the consumer has won a prize through the design of these mailings has to pay the consumer this price in accordance with Section 661a BGB.

In addition to the profit promises, certain “exclusive” gifts are also promised for each participant, which should be included in the price of the trip. If these items are actually given out, they are often cheap, mass-produced goods.

False promises

In August 2002, the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) affirmed the legal question as to whether coffee trips were false promises according to Section 16 (1) UWG , which constitute criminal advertising. The alleged profit in the cited case - a travel voucher worth 500 DM that was never handed over - was part of the service for a day trip at the price of 19.90 DM. Pyramid schemes are punishable under Section 16 (2) UWG if someone in the undertakes business dealings to induce consumers to purchase goods , services or rights by promising that they would obtain special advantages either from the organizer himself or from a third party if they induce others to conclude similar transactions, which in turn, according to the type of this advertising, such To gain advantages for a corresponding advertising of further customers.

Sales event

While the travelers are not formally obliged to participate, they are usually given little choice, because for the organizer this is the actual purpose of the trip. In practice, this is usually achieved through appropriately organized external circumstances: For example, the trip leads to a remote inn, which the (often older and handicapped) participants can hardly leave or the food (or coffee and cake) is only served in the room , in which the sales event also takes place.

Exceptionally inexpensive bus trips work in a similar way, where the low all-inclusive price for flight, bus travel, food and accommodation is made possible through sales commissions from participating dealers . Also, taxi drivers , bus drivers , tour guides and their employers get in sightseeing or round trips also commissions (or free lunches) for "mediation" of visitors, with excesses up to "two hours sightseeing and six hours shopping".

Products

The products offered are typically touted as revolutionary, completely new, not yet commercially available; they come in particular from the areas of health , nutrition , wellness and tourism . The participants are often suggested to be able to get hold of a bargain . Occasionally, installment payments are also offered to disguise the real price. The products are often inferior and overpriced.

Methods

It is not uncommon for event advertising to promise payouts of winnings, which then do not take place at all or not in the promised form. It is assumed that the mostly older participants, out of shame or ignorance, will refrain from registering and enforcing their claim.

Sales tricks and also unfair methods are typically used in product presentations to build up psychological pressure. For example, it is announced that lunch will only be served after a certain amount of purchases has been completed. Or employees of the organizer disguised as fellow travelers make the start by buying one of the items on offer, apparently enthusiastic. “Bargains” are also suggested by comparing the price of a product with the much higher recommended retail price that is actually in the article lists customary in retail, e.g. B. the Lauer tax (in pharmacy) can be found; However, this recommendation is a price set arbitrarily by the manufacturer. Additional incentives, such as allegedly limited availability or an allegedly time-limited special price, increase the pressure on participants. In the course of the event, the initially excessive purchase price is often significantly reduced as an incentive or several items are offered at a lower price as an overall package.

In retrospect, it is often very difficult for buyers to find and contact the selling company. This should make it more difficult to return the purchased item. In addition, the companies are often dissolved again after a short period of time or as planned into bankruptcy, so that claims can only be asserted with great difficulty.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Be careful with coffee trips with promises of profit. In: deutscher- Konsumerschutzverein.de. May 2010, accessed June 3, 2018 .
  2. ↑ BGH NJW 2002, 3415
  3. ^ Doris Huber: Cheap travel to Turkey - be careful with sales events. In: observer.ch. January 4, 2005, accessed August 15, 2018 .
  4. ↑ China: Tour guides are no longer allowed to receive commissions from souvenir shops. January 22, 2010, accessed June 6, 2012 .
  5. ↑ Coffee trips: Lots of false promises. Bavarian Consumer Advice Center, accessed on February 12, 2017 .