Timmy's Roll Up The Rim to Win is upon us again.  Millions upon millions of free coffees and donuts are up for grabs.  These are exciting times my friend, unless you live in Quebec!

In the good old days I used to win my free coffee very often.  I'm thinking maybe one in two, one in three.  Certainly I won many during the campaign.  But that was in Alberta.

Since I moved to Montreal Quebec a couple of years ago I still maintain my loyal morning Tims Double Double habit, changing it to a "Tres grand avec deux, deux" to fit in better.  The cups are the same, professing a "1 in 9" chance of winning.  Too bad I haven't won a single thing while the promotion has been on for at least two, maybe three weeks.  I must be so unlucky.  The funny thing is that when I travelled to Edmonton for business last week I bought 2 coffees and won a free one.

Let's do some math:

In Quebec I purchased at least 15 losing coffees.  Chances of losing with one purchase is 8/9 or about 89% according to the published odds.  Chances of losing 15 in a row is under 20% or quite low.

In Edmonton I purchased 2 coffees, one of which was a winner.  Chances of that happening is about 20%, again quite low if the published odds are correct.

Chances of both happening together is well under five percent, or what I would call, VERY LOW.  Except my work buddy experienced the same thing!  No wins in Montreal but as soon as he went to Saskatchewan to visit his folks he won.  Another buddy buys 2+ coffees a day, he figures maybe 50 coffees during the promotion, and he's won only once.  Chances of this are under 2%, again extremely low.

If we multiply all the probabilities from these stories together to get the changes of them all happening at the same time we're talking highly highly unlikely.

So, what is the story?  Is Tim Horton's directing fewer winning cups to Quebec, or Montreal, or just the Timmy's I frequent?  Does Western Canada deserve more winners?  Maybe they think Quebecers don't travel or don't have friends in other provinces.  Maybe a worker at my Tim's is stealing all the winners!

I think I'll ask a few more of my friends and direct a question to Timmy's themselves to see if this can be explained.