Taking a Shot

Dr Pepper/Seven Up this month starts shooting from behind the three-point line with a January-through-March college basketball-flavored campaign for 7-Up.

The Up Your Game effort, which follows a fall football-themed on-pack rebate promotion, features on-pack coupons, a mail-in sweepstakes, and an under-the-cap game giving consumers a one-in-12 chance of winning such prizes as hats, T-shirts, and sneakers from Brockton, MA-based partner Puma, as well as a grand-prize trip to Santa Monica for a shopping spree inside the apparel manufacturer’s flagship store.

Retail aisles will feature 12-packs boasting 55-cent coupons, while an additional sweeps serves $1,000 scholarships to 25 winners in each of the Mountain West, Big 12, Big East, Big Ten, and PAC 10 NCAA hoops conference regions. Troop Marketing, Dallas, handles. TV spots support throughout the effort, which will wind down with a sponsorship of ESPN’s Championship Week programming block in March to “satisfy our fanatic basketball fans,” says 7-Up promotions manager Jason Lewison.

Meanwhile, sibling soda brand Sunkist will launch a 60-day Experience the Charge campaign next month. Packaging will carry coupons and bottlers will chime in with a sweeps awarding audio systems from Chatsworth, CA-based consumer-electronics maker Fisher Corp. P-O-P supports. Harwood Marketing Group, Addison, TX, handles.

After enjoying success with its first-ever promotion, a fall Win-a-House campaign, online home-related services portal Move.com, San Francisco, ran a second giveaway offering one winner living expenses for an entire year.

The first sweepstakes generated more than 100,000 entries, helping the site to its highest level of traffic since its January 2000 launch. The effort awarded $250,000 in prize money to a Spokane, WA, woman. “We wanted to increase overall traffic and raise buzz about the Web site,” says chief marketing officer Scott Deaver. The second sweeps, which runs through Jan. 4, offered $30,000 toward a rent or mortgage costs in a campaign dubbed Live Free For a Year.

Looking to move piles of produce during the winter season, Dole Food Co., Westlake Village, CA, is inserting sweeps entries into 20-ounce cans of pineapple chunks, in bags of fresh-cut salads, and onto Dole bananas. The Dole Family Reunion sweepstakes offers one winner a trip to the Bahamas for 16 people. The program ends in late March. FSIs and P-O-P support. Flair Communications, Chicago, handles.

St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch announced a slight departure from the brew business with plans to launch a 30-market test of a new energy drink next month. The company is taking 180, an orange-flavored drink containing various vitamins and herbs, into c-stores, high-end bars, restaurants, health clubs, and other licensed accounts. Upcoming marketing support will center on the tagline, “Turn your energy around. Do a 180.” Ads and P-O-P will be handled by Shaw-Marconi Creative, St. Louis.

Zippo, Bradford, PA, is winding down a campaign that lets Internet surfers design their own lighters. The Web contest, anchored on mtv.com, is part of the brand’s new push to “position our lighters as the coolest way to light anything” among 18-to-34-year-olds, says marketing communications manager Pat Grandy. “This is the most interactive promotion we’ve ever done.”

The effort gives mtv.com visitors access to a paint program they can use to mock up stock pictures of Zippo lighters. After a judging, one winner earns a trip to New York City and 50 lighters customized to their design. TV spots and Web banner ads support. Pittsburgh-based Brattner Brunner handles.

Footwear and apparel maker Timberland, Stratham, NH, is taking the scenic route with Timberland PRO Mobile, an interactive tour traveling through 800 markets throughout 2001. Planned tour stops include industrial and construction sites, manufacturing plants, sports events, and community activities. Tour vehicles feature an “interactive consumer center” touting the company’s new products, along with technology and workplace safety displays. Visitors test out Timberland’s PRO boot line as well as tools from marketing partner Craftsman. Atlanta-based Mobile Marketing Enterprises handles.

Purchase, NY-based Pepsi-Cola this month finishes up a new nationwide program supporting music education in schools. The Share the Joy with Music program, which began last fall, encouraged consumers to help their local schools by collecting “Pepsi Notes” attached to product packaging. Schools redeem the Notes for musical instruments, accessories, sheet music, software, and other equipment via partner music123.com, a Cherry Hill, NJ-based online dealer.

The History Channel, New York City, is taking to the streets with a mobile tour bringing a little history to 50 cities. The History Channel Time Machine, a 48-foot mobile museum featuring interactive looks at U.S. history, will stop at 150 schools and festivals through September 2001. The History Channel will provide supplemental study materials for student lessons.

Salisbury, MD-based Purdue Farms debuted Choo-Choo chicken nuggets, train-shaped poultry pieces based on a design submitted by a contest winner. The seven-year-old winner of the company’s fall 1999 Nugget Design contest saw his creation translated into actual product last month. To drive purchase of the new shape, Purdue is executing an on-pack self-liquidating offer for a Thomas The Tank Engine drinking mug. Through a deal with London-based Britt Alcroft Ltd., shoppers mail in a proof-of-purchase and $2.99 for the 10-ounce mug. The program runs through the first quarter. DVC Group, Morristown, NJ, handles.

Santa Barbara, CA-based SecretCellars.com offered dot-com stock-market losers a chance to drown their sorrows by giving away a rare $1,500 bottle of 1996 Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon to the e-mail entrant with the hardest-luck investment story. Three runners-up received a $500 case of fine wine in a campaign that ran through the end of December.

Omaha, NE-based ConAgra Foods is running a Pokemon: The Movie on-pack rebate offer across its Banquet frozen-food line. Shoppers who buy two Banquet products can redeem coupons for three dollars off the purchase of the video or DVD. The effort runs through March. FSIs support.

Boston-based Student Advantage, an online and offline resource for students, is trying to catch the eyes of college students across the country by literally wrapping itself around Greyhound buses. In a joint effort with Greyhound designed to increase use of the Student Advantage stored-value card and Greyhound bus trips, four buses wrapped by promotional messages will travel the U.S. through August. Other marketers offering discounts through the Student Advantage card include Staples, Foot Locker, and CVS.com.

New York City-based Sports Illustrated and Elmwood Park, IL-based Internet entertainment network Akoo.com are in the midst of Campus Fest, a touring festival designed to introduce students to the latest in sports, music, the Internet, and personal technology. The festival will visit one million students on 25 universities through April, and also spend 10 days at Spring Break.