Toronto team tracks an impressive digital footprint and wins $100,000 for
"Doritos Tablet" in Doritos Viralocity contest

TORONTO, April 8 /CNW/ - The results are in. After six-and-a-half weeks of hard work, diligence and pure savvy within the online space, Jeff Chan has been crowned the winner of the Doritos Viralocity contest. Jeff, with help from partners David Fradkin and Patrick Lo, submitted the video "Doritos Tablet" which was rated and 'favourited' over 6,000 times & garnered over 672,000 unique total views, and over 1,000 shares and re-tweets (RT) through the Doritos Viralocity website alone.

"To say we are thrilled to win the Doritos Viralocity contest is an understatement," says Jeff Chan, the 24 year-old front man for "Doritos Tablet". "This contest has really given us the platform we needed to showcase our work and get a real start at launching our new production company. We've been given a confidence boost to know that we're headed in the right direction with our new business venture."

Jeff, David and Patrick, all alumni of Ryerson University, were on their way to starting up a new media production company called "We Can Pretend" when they heard about the Doritos Viralocity contest and agreed that it would be a great experience to create and submit a video. From concept to completion, it took the team 72 hrs to produce their entry, having only decided to enter at the end of February.

The winning entry ultimately won based on how "viral" it had become since the date it was submitted. The entry's success can be attributed to the unique idea and creative, and also Jeff and team's ability to push the video across social networks. Jeff will take home $100,000, the once mysterious unidentified Doritos tortilla chip flavour will now be called Spice 2.0, and Jeff's name will be featured on the bag.

With the $100,000 grand prize, Jeff and his partners are going to invest money into their company and towards their next project, as well as donate $10,000 to the Toronto Children's Hospital via Child's Play (www.childsplaycharity.org).

Along with "Doritos Tablet", the top 343 videos that placed after the winning entry are also being recognized and will be awarded cash prizes. Here are the other entrants that round out the top 4:

    
    -  2nd place: Peter Chao's Full Moon by Shane Smith from Vancouver,
       B.C.=$15,000
    -  3rd place: Doritos Surge by Shane Smith from Vancouver,
       B.C.=$10,000
    -  4th place: The Snax Effect Chimmichurri by Mitchell Bank from Toronto,
       ON=$5,000
    

All entries, including the top 344, can be found at www.doritos.ca

"The Doritos Viralocity program is all about handing control of the brand over to consumers, and challenging Canadians to step up and show their creativity in the online space. We were absolutely blown away by the number of submissions and the creative talents of Doritos fans from coast to coast. Collectively, our online community delivered unprecedented results, including making our Doritos Canada YouTube page number 1 on the planet, among all sponsored YouTube pages in March," says Tony Matta, Vice President, Marketing at Frito Lay Canada. "I'd like to personally congratulate all of the entrants and thank them for making Doritos Viralocity a global phenomenon!"

Launched on February 14, the Doritos(R) Viralocity contest was a nation-wide initiative that asked Canadians to name the newest Doritos unidentified flavour, create a 60 second online video about what that flavour inspires in them and make it go viral. Canadian response to the contest was overwhelming, with over 1,100 video entries submitted, over 7,000,000 video views, a YouTube following of over 3,500 subscribers, over 66,000 Facebook fans and the number 1 spot on the Ad Age Viral Video Chart for 2 weeks.

    
    About Doritos and PepsiCo Canada
    --------------------------------
    

Frito Lay Canada is a member of the PepsiCo, Inc. family of companies and is Canada's largest snack food company. Doritos is Canada's favourite brand of flavoured tortilla chip, leading the market in all regions. For more information, please visit www.doritos.ca. Doritos is one of PepsiCo Inc.'s flagship brands.

    
    About PepsiCo Canada
    --------------------
    

PepsiCo's businesses in Canada are organized into two business units. PepsiCo Foods Canada includes Frito Lay Canada and the Quaker Foods & Snacks business. PepsiCo Beverages Canada includes Pepsi-Cola Canada, Gatorade and Tropicana. For more information, please visit www.pepsico.ca.

    
    About PepsiCo
    -------------
    

PepsiCo offers the world's largest portfolio of billion-dollar food and beverage brands, including 19 different product lines that each generates more than $1 billion in annual retail sales. Our main businesses - Frito-Lay, Quaker, Pepsi-Cola, Tropicana and Gatorade - also make hundreds of other nourishing, tasty foods and drinks that bring joy to our consumers in more than 200 countries. With annualized revenues of nearly $60 billion, PepsiCo's people are united by our unique commitment to sustainable growth, called Performance with Purpose. By dedicating ourselves to offering a broad array of choices for healthy, convenient and fun nourishment, reducing our environmental impact, and fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace culture, PepsiCo balances strong financial returns with giving back to our communities worldwide. In recognition of its continued sustainability efforts, PepsiCo was named for the third time to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index (DJSI World) and for the fourth time to the Dow Jones Sustainability North America Index (DJSI North America) in 2009. For more information, please visit www.pepsico.com.

For further information: and interview requests, please contact: Megan Johnson, Fleishman-Hillard: [phone], [email protected]