Food for Thought
OK, so Coke and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone get top billing. But Minneapolis-based General Mills’ foodservice division next month ties into perhaps the second most-anticipated release of the holiday season, New York City-based New Line Cinema’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (September PROMO).
Targeting 12- to 24-year-olds, General Mills is delivering a sweepstakes-hosting kit to high school and college cafeteria operators who order qualifying General Mills products. “With so much excitement brewing around the movie, it will be a natural for foodservice operators to want to take advantage of the promotion and leverage that excitement in their dining hall,” says Heidi Munson, assistant manager-promotion marketing.
The kits include movie posters, static clings, frequent-purchase cards, and T-shirts and buttons to be worn by cafeteria staff. Students who request the cards and accumulate three purchase stamps receive a movie poster. The sweeps gives away electronics prizes including DVD players and color TVs from Wayne, NJ-based JVC, another Rings partner. General Mills handles in house.
The Fellowship of the Ring opens Dec. 19.
Dairy Management, Inc., Rosemont, IL, and the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board, Washington, DC, later this month wrap a one-month promotion for milk targeting teens. The got milk? Cyber Loot sweeps puts instant-win gamepieces under caps of gallon jugs. Prizes include $15 Music Cash certificates, free videogames, and 60 million discounts on game purchases from partner Electronic Arts, San Mateo, CA. Winners redeem the game prizes online (cyberloot.com) and the gift certificates through the mail. Marketing Drive Worldwide, Minneapolis, handles.
Redmond, WA-based Nintendo of America launched a $75 million marketing effort to support the rollout of its new GameCube system. A guerrilla campaign called Cube Club with Nintendo invades 12 cities to transform vacant lofts, office buildings, and other off-beat venues into dance clubs and sampling stations. The tour is sponsored by Stuff magazine, DC Comics, and Yahoo, Inc. Big Fat, Inc., New York City, handles. Elsewhere, an online contest dares folks to do crazy stunts to win GameCubes, and three million promotional CD-ROMS will be distributed in magazines and at retail — where some 10,000 P-O-P stations will let consumers sample the system prior to its Nov. 18 launch. Media support via Leo Burnett, Chicago, includes TV spots, print ads in 50 magazines, in-theater spots, and mall and in-school activity.
Bethesda, MD-based Discovery Communications has recruited two partners to promote the Dec. 9 premiere of Discovery Channel miniseries Walking with Prehistoric Beasts. Chicago-based Quaker Oats is inserting premiums into 10 million boxes of Life cereal featuring four different box fronts. Three thousand boxes will offer additional instant-win prizes including videos and toys. Packaging will also carry an offer for a free inflatable Tyrannosaurus Rex with the purchase of a video from discoverystore.com. Meanwhile, Ft. Lauderdale, FL-based Arby’s later this month breaks a kids’ premium program. (The QSR earlier this year inked a nine-promotion deal with Discovery that runs through fall 2002.)
M&M/Mars, Hackettstown, NJ, is running an online and in-store game called Hit the Code, Win the Cash. Consumers enter codes found under wrappers at hitthecode.com to determine if they’ve won the $1 million grand prize or thousands of other cash payouts. The game is running across the M&Ms, Twix, Skittles, Snickers, Starburst, Milky Way, and 3Musketeers brands through May 14.
Sears Roebuck & Co., Hoffman Estates, IL, is hosting a World’s Funniest Gift You Returned contest through Nov. 28 that asks consumers to submit their most humorous gift stories via mail or at sears.com/giftcardcontest for a shot at $5,000. Hispanic TV host Lucy Pereda will head the panel of judges that will pick the winner. The chain is donating one dollar to the American Red Cross for each entry. Elsewhere, customers who use their Sears Card to purchase a gift card are automatically entered into a sweeps giving away 10 $1,000 gift cards.
Dallas-based Blockbuster, Inc. and marketing partner DirecTV, also Dallas, are hosting balloting for the 2002 NFL Pro Bowl. Interactive voting kiosks are located in more than 5,200 Blockbuster locations through Dec. 2. (Fans can also vote at NFL games and at NFL.com.) Consumers who purchase a DirecTV system at Blockbuster stores before Nov. 15 and activate programming by Dec. 3 will be entered in a sweepstakes to win one of 10 trips to the Pro Bowl, played annually in Hawaii. TV, print, and radio advertising, in addition to P-O-P and online activity, support. Blockbuster, which handles in-house, inked a co-marketing deal with DirecTV in September 2000.
World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Stamford, CT, is running an education campaign and in-store effort at K-B Toys that brings WWF superstars into high schools to deliver positive messages about education, literacy, and safety. Dubbed Get R.E.A.L (for respect, education, achievement, and leadership), the effort features an essay contest co-sponsored by partner K-B Toys, Pittsfield, MA. Through Nov. 30, teens mail in 150-word essays on what the four tenets of Get R.E.A.L mean to them. (Entries can also be submitted at wwwfparents.com or kbtoys.com.) Three grand-prize winners receive a special assembly at their school with a WWF superstar. WWF and K-B handle in house.
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, Vienna, VA, teamed with educational software developer Knowledge Adventure, Los Angeles, to distribute a circus-themed CD-ROM in Oak Brook, IL-based McDonald’s restaurants in select markets over the next five months. All disks feature three educational games and activities, although each participating McDonald’s gets a customized offer (free with purchase of an Extra Value Meal in Chicago, free with Happy Meal purchase and a 69-cent donation to Ronald McDonald House in Cleveland, for instance). The Garr Group, Vorhees, NJ, handles.
Cambridge, MA-based Polaroid Corp. launched an instant-win game offering a grand-prize winner $100,000 to host “the party of a lifetime.” Through March 31, OneStep Express, Silver Express, Spectra 1200FF, and JoyCam instant cameras and multi-packs of Spectra film carry gamepieces. Select packaging also contains coupons for Polaroid products redeemable through Dec. 31. Consumers can also enter the sweeps at polaroid.com/party. P-O-P, national print ads, and circulars at key retail accounts support. DVC Group, Morristown, NJ, handles.
Ford Motor Co., Detroit, teen site Bolt.com, New York City, and the White House are teaming on an 18-city mall concert tour dubbed the Ford Focus Sound Check. Ford is using the tour to showcase its 2002 Focus ZX3, while Freevibe.com, the Web site of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy’s National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, lets attendees write about the interests they pursue instead of drugs on a 750-foot graffiti scroll that will be submitted to the Guinness Book of World Records. Bolt.com supports by displaying digital photos of the concerts online for its five million teen members.
In-store coin counter Coinstar, Bellevue, WA, is giving consumers a chance to unload spare change to earn discounts off movie purchases. Through a partnership with Burbank, CA-based Warner Home Video, Coinstar customers who process at least $5 worth of change between Nov. 18 and Dec. 31 get a rebate form for $5 off one of seven Warner video releases. Coinstar has machines in 9,000 supermarkets nationwide.
Tanger Factory Outlet Centers, Greensboro, NC, celebrates its 20th holiday season by tying into the Twentieth Century Fox release Joe Somebody, starring Tim Allen. From Nov. 10 through Dec. 10, shoppers can be “Somebody Special” by entering a sweepstakes giving away 20 prizes including a family vacation to Hollywood and a behind-the-scenes tour of Fox Studios, $2,000 in diamond jewelry from Zales Jewelers, a $2,000 Tanger shopping spree, and a vacation for four to Captiva Island, FL. Consumers can enter at special centers within the 1,100 Tanger outlets or online at tangeroutlet.com. Meanwhile, Coca-Cola vending machines in the outlets contain an under-the-cap game dangling Joe Somebody mini-movie posters. The effort is handled in-house.
