Doritos Pares Super Bowl Contest Entries to 10

Frito-Lay is asking people to vote for their favorite song in the latest version of its Super Bowl contest.

Doritos has pared down its pool of more than 350 entries to 10 finalists in its Crash the Super Bowl contest, in which people have a chance to have a music video made of their song and aired during Super Bowl XLII on Feb. 3.

“Once again, consumers blew us away,” Rudy Wilson, director of marketing for Frito-Lay’s Doritos brand, said. “We had a lot of quality submissions.”

Visitors to http://www.snackstrongproductions.com can vote on their favorite performer through Dec. 31. Musical styles include Hip Hop, alternative rock, rap and singer-songwriter submissions, Wilson said.

A panel of judges, including Doritos reps, musician and producer will.i.am, A&R executive vice president and producer for Geffen Records Jack Joseph Puig and A&R executive for Interscope Geffen A&M Records Ryan O’Donnell selected the finalists based on creative inspiration, musical ability and stage presence. Videos were submitted in October (Promo Xtra, Oct. 12, 2007).
http://promomagazine.com/contests/news/doritos_songs_super_bowl/index.html

The three semi-finalists will be revealed on Jan. 7; each will receive $10,000 and a trip to Phoenix to attend the Doritos Super Bowl party. People will vote once again from that group to pick the grand-prize winner.

The winner gets a record deal with Interscope Geffen A&M Records and will create a music video of their song. That 60-second video will be played during the Super Bowl in place of a traditional ad Doritos normally runs during the Big Game.

Doritos is not using the video to promote its products.

“This program is not about Doritos,” Wilson said. “These 60 seconds are about celebrating the fans of Doritos and celebrating the passions of those fans. You won’t be seeing a [Doritos] bag shot in middle of the spot.”

This is the second promotion Doritos has launched tied to the Super Bowl involving user-generated content. Last year, the company ran a contest asking people to submit 30-seconds spots for the brand. The firm fielded more than 1,000 entries.

Doritos is promoting this year’s contest via cinema advertising, TV spots during playoff games, packaging, P-O-P and online.

The Marketing Arm is handling overall concept development and in-store design elements. Goodby Silverstein & Partners, Doritos’ ad agency, oversees the Web site development and on-air execution. OMD is managing media buying while Davie-Brown is handling the record label details. Ketchum is in charge of PR.

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