20 Strangers Online Share Their Stories About "Lifetime Supply" That Will Blow Your Mind

Everyone has probably heard of the "lifetime supply" gimmick at some point in their lives — a promotion that entices customers in by promising to shower the winner with corporate goods for the rest of their lives. Isn't it like something out of a dream?
Winning a lifetime supply of anything, be it chocolate, toilet paper, or even something as mundane as paper clips, would be fantastic. However, most of us have never had such a win and only have our imaginations to go on, but don't worry – this online user has you covered.
"How did you win a 'lifetime supply' contest, Redditors?" "How's it going?" says the narrator. — this internet user went to one of Reddit's most educational and thought-provoking forums to find out how getting a lifelong supply of anything worked out for the winners and whether it was as magical as we all imagine. Nearly 26K people have upvoted the post, and 17.6K people have shared anecdotes of the phenomenon.

#1 Reader's digest

This was in the 90s, my Granddad won a lifetime supply of Reader's Digest. He was the only doctor in a small village in India (population < 1000). He started stacking them up in his clinic, and the village kids would randomly browse through them. As long as there wasn't a rush or they weren't being loud, my Granddad would let them sit there for as long as they wanted.
I spent my summer vacations in the village with my grandparents. (My parents had moved to a nearby city long before I was born)
And so it happened that every summer I'd come to the village to find my rural friends speak better English than anyone else in the village - and in some cases better than my English-school educated city friends - and sharing jokes from the "Life's like that" and "Laughter is the best medicine" sections.
Everytime I think back on it, I feel happy and proud of my granddad.

#2 Nike shoes

When I was in college a guy in my fraternity was featured in a Nike running commercial. He was paid a fixed amount and they would randomly send him shoes throughout the 2 years I knew him. After he graduated shoes still showed up at the house every quarter until I graduated.
The funny part of the story is that he was on the University cross country team (D1) and when he signed the paperwork it voided his scholarship. The coach calls him in his office and berates him for a half hour on how he "f****d up his scholarship." His response was priceless: "I have 4 more semesters and Nike paid me enough to cover in-State tuition for that time. Also, I hate running, but am good enough to have gotten a scholarship. Now I have school paid for and will never run again. Good luck to you all though."

#3 Blockbuster rentals

When I was a kid I won 2 free Blockbuster rentals a month for life. Was awsome for a while now it's not going so well....

#4 Sonic gift cards

A friend of mine won lifetime Sonic on a radio contest. Every month he gets a Sonic gift card for $200 and he takes everyone up there for a free meal and spends the rest buying random peoples' meals.

#5 Coffee beans

I won a lifetime supply of coffee beans for having guessed how many beans were in the tall glass jar during a competition.
They arrive faster than I can use them, but the beans are high quality and make fun gifts for friends who like to grind & brew.

#6 Pizza hut's pizza

Obligatory not me but a friend. a friend of mine won a lifetime supply of pizza from pizza hut. they calculated his age, the average pizzas a person consumes per year, did some mathemagical calculation and fed ex'd him a check for $37,000. In my book he won.

#7 Pet food

My wife won a "lifetime supply" of pet food for our cat. They didn't even bother sending product, they just tacked another few thousand dollars onto the $10k cash prize. That was a nice little windfall. The only weird thing was that it was paid as a stack of maxed out Visa gift cards. You can't really pay things like mortgages and credit card bills with what amounts to a credit card, so we ended up using the gift cards for things like groceries. It's pretty amazing how far your paycheck goes when your bill for food and incidentals is effectively zero.

#8 Snickers bars

Our elderly neighbours won a lifetime supply of Snickers. We have a very large family (parents plus 10 kids) and the summer I was 7 my father was injured at work. While waiting on workers comp to be paid, our electric, water, and gas was all shut off. Our neighbours ran a hose to our backyard for water, an extension cord for a microwave, and gave us dozens of cases of Snickers. We lived the entire summer on candy bars and ramen. I can't stand the stuff now.

#9 Paprika

We had to write a one page essay on anything one year in class and my friend wrote about how he loved paprika as a F**k you to the teacher. She mailed it to some spice company and now they send him a jar a month and he hates it.

#10 KY Jelly

I won a lifetime supply of KY Jelly, so far it's going smoothly.

#11 Broadband

Not so much won, but my mother in law has free broadband for life. Company needed to run a line through her garden, MIL says sure, but I want free internet forever, hasn't paid a cent in two years and the disruption to the back garden was minimal and easily fixed.

#12 Apples

When I was little, I won a lifetime supply of apples by correctly guessing how many were in a barrel. There were 110 and I guessed 109. The prize was 110 apples at a time each month. It was insane. After the first delivery, my parents begged them to stop. It's impossible for a family of three to go through 110 apples before they rot and our neighbors stopped answering the door when they saw my parents standing there with bags of apples.

#13 Vegemite

I won a lifetime supply of Vegemite. It was only 2 jars

#14 Sadness

I won a lifetime supply of sadness at the ripe old age of birth.

#15 Cheese

#16 Rice-a-roni

I'm really into competitions, and although I've never won a lifetime supply of anything I've won a years worth of cheese. Twice. The first time was 12 vouchers but for the second one they actually send me two massive f**k-off cheese wheels, they were like 25lb each. I cut them up and filled my fridge and freezer (and the fridge and freezers of my friends) with cheese. It actually froze/defrosted really well, I'll be eating that cheese for ages.

#17 Aluminum Foil

Won a lifetime supply of knives. I guessed correctly how many sheets of paper the knife could stab through. After I broke the first two, I was told my third was my last one. Apparently the knives were supposed to last a lifetime.

#18 Arby's Gift Cards

I have a friend that did an Arby's comercial years ago. They gave him an Arby's card that can be used for up to $20 or $25 a day. It's like a gift card that gets topped off daily.

Only bad thing is he can't save the credit to make a big purchase. It has a cap of $25.

#19 Domino's Pizza

Dominos Pizza at a raffle. It was a "lifetime supply" Basically was a book with 4 tear out coupons a month for like 20 years. Used it maybe a dozen times. After about 2 years I tried to use it and it becomes such a pain, nobody knows what to do, the computer won't take it, they have to call corporate support # on the ticket. Takes like 30 minutes on the phone to order shitty pizza for free. So basically it will never be used.
Edit: good lord my box exploded. I'll answer a few of the common theme questions here so the fire crew can get a handle on the inbox.
1. Yes I still have it (I think... 95% sure)
2. No I won't give it to you.3. Random Acts of pizza, I will look into doing this if I can. I like this Idea.4. Not sure if they are transferable I'm pretty sure there is no designation to just me,
5. They are all dated, 52 coupons a year. They can only be used on that specific week for the year. If you don't use a coupon in that week it's expired.6. Yes I know there are worse pizza's out there, and there probably is tasty pizzas at Domino. I had actually forgotten about it for almost a year till I saw this thread.7. I got it when I was in college. So about 1999/2000, so we are coming to the end.8. Thinking about it, I probably actually used more then I thought when I was younger and poor. Maybe 30-40 times total in the 16-17 years. But I don't think I've used it once in the last 5.
Edit Edit: Today I discovered not cashing in on free pizza ranks up there with loving Nazi's.
Update 8/25/2016: I did find it, and I gave it to a neighbor with a teenage boy that's having a rough time right now. She did use it and they did take it.
Update 8/30/16: I still can't believe the continuing response to this and how many people want to know how this is turning out, so question answering time part duex.
1. The neighbor I gave this to has used this at least twice now. Domino's couldn't figure out how to use it when she called and order in but had no problems processing it when she did a pickup at the store.2. There is no name on the coupon's so as of yet nobody has questioned her on it. I doubt they would at this point and risk offending all of Reddit.3. Her son counted the missing coupons at around 120. I don't remember ever using that many however maybe I did, or more likaly probably gave them away. It has been a LOOONNGGG time.4. The Last coupon is dated for the final week of December 2018, which means I actually got it in 1998 which would mean I was still in High school. Maybe I was. I do remember most of the time I used it was at LAN Parties (yes I was..am a major nerd)
5. I have actually been contacted by people "claiming" to be from Domnios. No I don't plan on giving anyone the information on who owns it now.6. For all those who continue to want to buy it off me. It's gone, Stop asking. I wouldn't ever have sold it anyways just to avoid the possibility of any hidden problems.7. For all those who continue to try and "gently" persuade me to use it on random act of pizza and why I did what I did. Here is why. A. I love the concept of random acts of pizza, but I'm sure a reasonable percentage of requests don't actually NEED the pizza. B. I didn't want to try and figure out how to utilize these coupons over the phone at random locations all over the US. C. The person I gave it too I know is in need and genuinely can/will use them. Granted it's only 1 free dinner a week for her and son, but that does add up, and can at least lesson a little bit of her burden.