Mountain Dew brings back Mtn Dew Pitch Black on Facebook

via Food Bev

Mountain Dew has made the cult classic Mtn Dew Pitch Black available to consumers once again for three days, exclusively on Facebook.

Mtn Dew Pitch Black was first released in October 2004 as a Halloween limited edition flavour and was brought back in the summer of 2011 as part of the brand’s Back by Popular DewMand programme. As Mountain Dew explained, it has gone dark ever since.

But now the brand has marked the drink’s return with a giveaway competition, offering consumers the chance to win one of a limited number of packs.

Mountain Dew launched a campaign offering fans the chance to enter the Mtn Dew Pitch Black sweepstakes for a chance to win a free 15-pack case of the beloved beverage. A number of fans who visited the brand’s Facebook page and explained why they wanted a case of Pitch Black using the hashtag #WeWantPitchBlack were rewarded with a prized pack. There was one chance to enter for each of the three days of the sweepstakes, and in total 1,050 lucky fans were selected to win a case of Mtn Dew Pitch Black.

“Best day ever,” wrote on entrant upon being informed that they’d been selected to receive one of the limited edition packs. “Oh. My. God,” added another.

Crystal Pepsi Is Back, But You Have To Win It To Sip It

via Huffington Post

Good news, '90s kids: Crystal Pepsi is back in all its clear, caffeine-free glory. 

But don't rush to the grocery store just yet. You'll have to win your soda, as Pepsi is giving away 13,000 six-packs of Crystal Pepsi in a special sweepstakes. 

The competition -- and the party -- is really heating fizzing up. 

You may remember Crystal Pepsi as the short-lived soda that disappeared from shelves in 1993. Pepsi hinted at the drink's return in June, when competitive eater Kevin Strahle started a social media movement asking for a comeback. 

Now that time has come: Nostalgic soda-seekers can enter the Crystal Pepsi sweepstakes by joining the free Pepsi Pass program and using the Pepsi Pass app. (You have to earn points to enter the sweepstakes, but don't worry: You'll get a hefty sign-up bonus when you start using the app.)

Entries will be accepted on Dec. 10 and 11, with Crystal Pepsi packs shipping out to 13,000 winners around Dec. 24. 

What a merry Pepsi-mas that would be.

PepsiCo Creator Division Develops Immersive Creative Experiences

via Food Dive

Dive Brief:

• For the past 18 months, Creator has been PepsiCo North America Beverages' in-house division tasked with devising innovative ways to use immersive experiences to foster engagement with consumers.
• Creator debuted the Pepsi Art Dome, developed for PepsiCo by digital animated art site Likuid Art, at the Voodoo Music and Arts Experience in New Orleans on Halloween weekend. The 40-foot dome was an interactive art experience that was "raining lights and color on an audience sprawled out on couches," and "The 18 minutes of extrasensory chill-out culminates in swirling blue and red color whisps that coalesce into the Pepsi logo," according to Fast Company.
• The staff at Creator search for emerging trends in a variety of spaces, from sports and entertainment to technology and lifestyle, and then cultivate those concepts via artistic collaborations between PepsiCo brands, artists, and corporate partners.

Dive Insight:

"Creator is about transformation in marketing, how we embrace risk, deploy disruptive technology, and connect with consumers in new and different ways," Seth Kaufman, CMO for PepsiCo North America Beverages, told Fast Company. "Consumers are on multiple devices. Creator helps us stay on the leading edge of culture and break through the clutter. In today’s crowded communication landscape, connecting with consumers is hard, so we look for things like that to tap into their passions."

With the Pepsi Art Dome, PepsiCo and Likuid Art were careful to not create an explicit commercial for the company but to build something that seamlessly integrated with the rest of the festival's art pieces. They used only "subtle branding towards the end," Chris Saunders, Likuid Art's creative director, told Fast Company. 

What's also unique about Creator is that it tends to act more like a startup itself rather than a division of a major corporation, wherein the staff are constantly experimenting, learning, and updating each idea that comes their way.

"For a Fortune 50 packaged goods company, that’s a massive shift and a great way to think about innovation—seeing something, learning from it, putting something out into the market, learning from that experience, and making it better the next time," Kaufman told Fast Company. "We’ll take what we did at Voodoo, which was incredibly successful, build on it, and the next thing we put into the marketplace will be more effective."

The Pepsi Art Dome was the first of three installations that PepsiCo will launch in partnership with Live Nation Entertainment. The next will be at Farmborough Festival in New York in June.