Ocean Mist Farms Welcomes Peak Artichoke Season With Sweepstakes

CASTROVILLE, Calif. – Ocean Mist Farms is supporting sales of fresh artichokes this spring with the company’s first-ever consumer sweepstakes.

The sweepstakes, Easy to Make Easy to Win, is intended to build excitement for the fresh artichoke crop with shoppers nationwide and drive membership in Ocean Mist Farms’ Artichokes Aficionados club.

The sweepstakes is running six weeks, from March 28 through May 6. During that period, shoppers are directed to Ocean Mist Farms’ new mobile site, m.oceanmist.com, where they can enter to win a grand prize of $10,000.

In addition, every week during the six-week promotional period, 10 people will win a case of field fresh artichokes.

Ocean Mist Farms is promoting the sweepstakes with in-store signage, a display contest and stickers on the handles of all its club-store bag packages. Retail stores can order sweepstakes point of sale on http://www.oceanmist.com/html/trade/point-of-sale.aspx.

Digitally, Ocean Mist Farms is advertising the sweepstakes through ads on Facebook. The company is also adding a quick-response (QR) code to all of its point of sale and packaging to prompt instant, in-store interaction with shoppers at the store level, said Kori Tuggle, director of marketing and business development.

“We’re using all of our communication vehicles: On pack, in store, our website, Facebook and Twitter, to tell our artichoke story,” Tuggle said. “This is the first time we’re offering artichoke lovers a sweepstakes and we’re excited to see how they respond. We’ve been visiting our retail customers across the country to tell them about the sweepstakes and their response has been overwhelmingly positive.”

In Northern California, where fresh artichoke sales have the highest velocity, Ocean Mist Farms is also providing traditional media outlets such as newspaper, radio and TV stations, with information about Castroville’s spring harvest and the sweepstakes.

Ocean Mist Farms predicts a good-size crop out of Castroville, Calif., this season, similar in size to the 2010 harvest, with promotable quantities throughout the spring.

For more information visit www.oceanmist.com.

About Ocean Mist Farms

Ocean Mist Farm’s growers are focused on meeting the needs of their customers and consumers. That means they are committed to the highest standards in the industry for quality, service, innovation, social responsibility and delivering year-round premium fresh vegetables. Ocean Mist Farms is four generations of family farmers who lead the artichoke category and also are leaders in growing a full line of fresh vegetables.

Source: Ocean Mist Farms