The events will be held in Philadelphia (June 24), Ocean City, Md. (July 2), Virginia Beach, Va. (July 9) and Egg Harbor Township, N.J. (July 15).
Attendees are invited [image-nocss] by Wawa and its tie dye-clad associates to sing and dance to original Hoagiefest songs, as well as to tour an exhibit featuring imagery and photos of famous hoagie moments in history. In addition, the Hoagiefest tour will feature a mile of Wawa Hoagies served free throughout the four stops, a quarter-mile-long hoagie at each event.
Among the activities featured at each Hoagiefest are:
Hoagiefest Morning Build. Before each event begins, Wawa associates will prepare to pay tribute to the hoagie by building the quarter-mile-long Hoagie to serve to the crowd later that day. Hundreds of pounds of ingredients will be featured as dozens of associates begin building the Hoagiefest feast at 5:30 a.m., in the stores on the site of the Hoagiefest events. The Hoagiefest feast will be loaded onto a refrigerated truck to serve to attendees free later that day.
Hoagiefest Time Capsule. Wawa's president and CEO Howard Stoeckel will officially kick off each Hoagiefest Event with words about Wawa's great hoagie tradition, a tradition made possible by a love of buildingand eatingevery Wawa Hoagie. To honor this tradition properly, associates will bury a hoagie time capsule at the conclusion of each event, filled with Hoagies as well as other meaningful Wawa items.
"Woodstock is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and Wawa is celebrating the 45th anniversary of our very first store in 1964, so a 1960s theme is a perfect fit for Hoagiefest," said Howard Stoeckel, Wawa's president and CEO. "Just as we have since the 1960's, we create all of our products with the passion and love we feel for our company and our food. The time capsule is a way for us to reflect the importance of this occasion and capture this feeling for generations to come."
Kara-Hoagie. Throughout the event, Wawa will host "Kara-hoagie" contests, a spin on karaoke that makes everyone a part of the Hoagiefest event. Contestants will be invited to "sing" hoagiefest songs using a karaoke machine, and there will be a contest for customers and associates all vying to win a month's supply of hoagies!
Hoagiefest Heroes: Relay for the Community. As a conclusion to each Hoagiefest event, local police officers, firefighters and other key community heroes will come together for the ultimate hoagie eating competition, squaring off against each other (two teams of four) to see which team can eat the four featured Hoagiefest Shorti Hoagie varieties in the fastest amount of time. The Hoagiefest Heroes competition will be a relay race, as community heroes attempt to eat and cross the finish line after finishing the hoagies. They are eating their hearts out for their communities! Win or lose, Wawa will make a charitable donation on behalf of each team, to the community cause of their choice.
Giveaways & Prizes. Each Hoagiefest event will feature giveaways including Hoagiefest t-shirts, bumper stickers and CDs of Hoagiefest music, as well as exciting prizes including, cash awards to charities and one month's worth of hoagies to Hoagiefest Kara-hoagie winners.
Hoagiefest is also celebrating the hoagie with special price promotions and events carried on throughout the summer. Beginning June 1 and running through July 26, a different Wawa Shorti will be featured every two weeks for just $2.99.
"We're thrilled to host our second annual Hoagiefest campaign. It's a way to thank our associates and customers for the unconditional love imbued in the building and eating of every single Hoagie made in our stores," said Stoeckel. "It's all about bringing our customers their favorite hoagies at an incredible value, in a time when reasonable prices matter most."
Wawa has created a microsite completely dedicated to Hoagiesfest. Customers can now enter into an interactive hoagie world and experience all the "peace, love and provolone anyone could ever want" by logging onto www.Wawa.com and clicking directly on www.Hoagiefest.com. Hoagiefest is going on in all of Wawa's 570 stores throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia and runs through July 26.
The microsite includes 1960s-inspired images and moving icons, a contest to submit original songs or to lipsync a video devoted to the hoagie, a menu detailing the promoted hoagies (Italian, June 1-14; cheesesteak, June 15-28; turke, June 29-July 12; and meatball, July 13-26), a tour schedule detailing the Hoagiefest event dates, three custom Hoagiefest songs to download and a Facebook application featuring the Hoagiefest campaign.
In addition, Wawa will feature Hoagiefest billboards, banners, truck wraps and radio ads. And a customer version of the Hoagiefest tie-dyed t-shirt is also available for purchase on the retailer's website for a limited time.
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