Tuesday, April 27, 2004 is bound to be a busy day at Ben & Jerry’s Scoop Shops. That’s the company’s 26th annual Free Cone Day. The first 50,000 customers in the U.S. who sign up for a sweepstakes at this year’s event will also be able to get a code redeemable for a free song at Apple’s iTunes Music Store. The sweepstakes grand prize winner gets an iPod, an iMac and a trip to Ben & Jerry’s headquarters in Vermont to become an honorary “Flavor Guru,” where the winner gets to make a batch of their own personal flavor of ice cream.
Ben & Jerry’s expects the iTunes promotion and the free ice cream to be popular with young people. This year the company is also teaming up with Rock the Vote in an effort to help drive voter registration and encourage young people to become politically active. Starting on Free Cone Day, you can register to vote at selected Scoop Shops. Ben & Jerry’s plans to hold additional voter registration days at specific shops this May through September.
Although voter registration and the free iTunes songs are something specific to the United States, Free Cone Day is something that happens at Ben & Jerry’s Scoop Shops worldwide — the company has more than 230 shops in the US, Canada, the UK, Spain, German, Korea, Hong Kong, Belgium, Ireland, The Netherlands, Israel and France.
Ben & Jerry’s advises that free iTunes downloads are limited to one per person. Free songs will be available until all codes have been distributed.