Yet another post about an ad; I guess that’s what happens when I spend time in New York! Pepsico caught my attention with a Mountain Dew sponsored event that was very well-executed: DewTour. DewTour was a skiing/snowboarding competition held in Vermont at Mount Snow last weekend. The event itself is a great start, because it fits the image of Mountain Dew as “extreme.”
The only place I saw ads for the DewTour (someone correct me if I’m wrong) was on trains headed to and from the north suburbs of New York City. While this may not initially sound like great publicity, it seems brilliant to me. For starters, extreme sports, including snowboarding and skiing, are extremely targeted groups; I’m sure that by bringing in the top athletes in the field those who follow the sports closely already knew what was going on. To generate additional publicity, 
they didn’t need to spend money for a full-blown campaign. The majority of people who visit the Mount Snow area are residents of those suburbs of New York where it’s considered a popular winter vacation spot, and most of them also commute to work via train.
I don’t know what kind of numbers can be assigned to the awareness/sales generated by DewTour, but we couldn’t find any parking at Mount Snow to watch or even ski, so I think it’s safe to say the event was a hit.
