In April, UPS, in conjunction with The UPS Store®, announced plans to once again team up in support of Toys for TotsSM. This year's program has a twist in that a lucky child between the ages of 5 and 12 will be the designer of the 2006 paint scheme.
As part of the April announcement, Dale Jarrett and officials from The UPS Store unveiled a life-size #88 Ford "template" car at Texas Motor Speedway (TMS) to announce the "Design Dale's Ride" coloring contest, giving children an opportunity to design their own race car. One entrant would be selected as a grand prize winner with his or her design becoming the car Jarrett will race in the Dickies 500 at TMS on November 5th.
Children from across the United States entered their submissions April 1 - 29th. By the deadline of April 29th, more than 2,500 entries were submitted. A selection committee consisting of a panel of judges from UPS and The UPS Store selected 10 paint schemes from which the grand prize winner would be selected.
"We received some very creative entries," Jarrett said of the multitude of submissions. "It's pretty amazing some of the stuff kids come up with and just how creative someone that young is."
The 10 finalists in the "Design Dale's Ride" coloring contest included children from California, Washington, Pennsylvania, Indiana, New York, Virginia, Michigan, New Jersey and Texas. To determine the grand prize winner, UPS and The UPS Store decided to let the public weigh in on the selection process. Thus, fans across the country were given the opportunity to vote on the final design.
"I'd be proud to race a car featuring any one of these designs," Jarrett said of the final 10. "I'm glad we're conducting a public vote to help determine the winner because otherwise, I'd have a tough time choosing just one."
From May 20-29, fans were able to vote by logging onto www.theupsstore.com. Popular opinion among the public will make up 25% of the final decision with the following 75% determined by a panel representing The UPS Store (25%), UPS Racing (25%) and Dale Jarrett, Inc. (25%).
More than 22,000 votes were cast during the 10 days of voting. UPS will announce the winning artist and design during the weekend of the Pepsi 400 at Daytona International Speedway (DIS), June 29-July 1st. The winner, along with his or her parents, will receive a trip to the Pepsi 400 in Daytona Beach, Fla., and the winner, with help from Jarrett, will unveil the paint scheme in the Fan Zone at DIS on Thursday, June 29th.
In addition to the trip to Daytona, the winner will receive a hometown viewing party to watch the car race on Nov. 5th at TMS, a custom-fit, autographed racing suit to match the one Dale will wear, and a Crayola® prize pack including Crayola Color ExplosionTM, Crayola TwistablesTM and Crayola Erasable Markers. Additionally, the winner's school will receive 10,000 free copies from The UPS Store along with an art supplies package for the art department, courtesy of Crayola.
