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30,000 people who spent $200 on a toy puzzle is by no means a small number. Luxury goods purchases follow a power law, and the value of capturing a portion of the fat side of that curve is huge. If they're willing to spend $200 on a puzzle, imagine what they'd spend on something they perceive they need.

Dead on. Its $200 on a puzzle, which simultaneously shows that the person cares about this $200 more than their personal information, which is damn useful for marketing.

It's a low number in terms of # of profile listing for a telemarketer. Telemarketers buy on the order of hundreds of thousands or millions.

hundreds of thousands or millions.

Are they telemarketing to a planet that I don't know about? Wouldn't that be hundreds of billions?

Are they buying lots of duplicates or something like that, then combining all the info themselves?

Or, not of.

/facepalm

oops.

That may be true, but it's more than "a thousand or so".