Daniel picked a three-Michelin-star restaurant for his birthday.

Then he asked the obvious question. What does a tire company know about food?

The answer goes back to France in 1900, when two brothers named Andre and Edouard Michelin had a tire company and a problem. There were fewer than three thousand cars in the entire country. No cars meant no driving. No driving meant no tires. So they came up with an idea -- a small free guide to make driving more appealing. It had maps of French roads, instructions for changing tires, lists of mechanics and petrol stations, and -- to make the journey worthwhile -- restaurants and hotels along the way.

The restaurants were not the point. The point was getting people to drive further and wear out more tires. The guide was a marketing tool, nothing more. And they gave it away for free.