Texas Cadillac Dealers Announces Two Winners of Team Escalade Texas: Cure Duchenne and Taylor’s Gift

Today, the Texas Cadillac Dealers announced Cure Duchenne and Taylor’s Gift as the winners of Team Escalade Texas, a multimarket, multimedia campaign in Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin and San Antonio involving six charities, 19 celebrities, four cities and one bold drive to change lives. The goal of Team Escalade Texas was to educate fellow Texans about the six chosen charitable organizations as well as to increase interest, volunteers and donations for those charities. Team Escalade Texas (www.TeamEscaladeTexas.com) began September 22 and concluded October 30, 2011.  Cure Duchenne will receive a $150,000 media campaign that launches in four cities in February 2012. However because, the difference between first and second place was only 500 votes, Cadillac has opted to reward Taylor’s Gift as well with a similar media package in March 2012.

All of the charities benefited from increased exposure with the public. The other five charities were Love Hope Strength, Ronald McDonald House Charities, Special Olympics Texas and The YMCA.

Notable statistics include:

• An increase in the official Texas Organ Donor Registry of 90,000 since the Team Escalade Texas promotion began on 9/21 (there are currently over 112,000 people awaiting organ donor transplants in the US).
• 200 people have signed up to be bone marrow donors.
• Cure Duchenne’s Mindy Huber reported that a mom whose little boy was diagnosed with Duchenne back in January heard about Cure Duchenne through a post on one of the dealership’s Facebook pages. She has faced extreme challenges during the past 10 months: when she got the diagnosis, she was offered nothing in the way of support...no groups to join, no parent organizations to look into and no emotional help whatsoever.
• An increase in 14,100 plus fans on the Texas Cadillac Dealers Facebook pages.
• 408 people buzzed in using the donated BestBuzz app for a total of 170,422 Friend-to-Friend social impressions.
• Team Escalade Texas webpage accounted for 150,000 page views with an average of five minutes per visit.
• The Twitter campaign touched over 850,000 people.
• The teams participated in 47 events throughout the state.
• Had over 700 media write-ups.
• $750,000 in media support.
• Over 45,000 votes.

Tom D’Angelo of Regional Marketing Manager of Cadillac said, “The Texas Cadillac Dealers were so touched by the outpouring of support to our challenge to VOTE, SHARE, and ACT to make a difference.  When the final tally of votes came through, it exceeded our expectations. We felt that the final count was so close for Cure Duchenne and Taylor’s Gift, accounting for 40,000 of the 45,000 votes and only a difference between the two of 500 votes. The Texas Cadillac Dealers felt compelled to award both charities with a media package. Cure Duchenne was the charity with the most votes; therefore they will be awarded first with the $150,000 media campaign in four cities in February 2012. We will follow up in March 2012 with a similar media package for Taylor’s Gift.  This is our way of listening to Texas Cadillac Dealers’ fans and thanking them, the charities, and the champion athletes for a job well done when asked to make a difference to change lives. Never take the spirit of a Texan for granted: we are in awe of the support, outreach and heartwarming response.”

Texas Cadillac dealers produced a public service announcement (PSA) video for each of the six charities and provided them with valuable assets to publicize and promote the PSA.  Throughout the campaign, people voted on each charity’s videos on www.TeamEscaladeTexas.com.

The celebrities who joined Team Escalade Texas team captain Drew Pearson were:

CureDuchenne – Daryl Johnston, Rocket Ismail, Dan Pastorini and Reid Gettys
Taylor’s Gift Foundation – Everson Walls, Danieal Manning and Mike Renfro
Love Hope Strength – Mike Modano, Brent Severyn and N.D. Kalu
Ronald McDonald House Charities – Randy White, Jay Novacek and Matt Bullard
Special Olympics Texas – Carly Patterson, Laura Wilkinson and Zina Garrison
The YMCA – Brian Cardinal, Derek Harper and Alphonso Roundtree

Media Contacts:

Lisa Taylor
lisa@TrizCom.com
214-914-1099
Or
Jo Trizila
jo@TrizCom.com
o: 972-247-1369 
c: 214-232-0078

About Team Escalade Texas
Team Escalade Texas was a charity challenge sponsored by Texas Cadillac Dealers that aims to increase public awareness and support for vital Texas charities. Six teams, 19 celebrities, four cities and one bold drive to save lives. The challenge ran through October 30, 2011.

About Cadillac
Cadillac has been a leading luxury auto brand since 1902. In recent years, Cadillac has engineered a historic renaissance led by artful engineering and advanced technology. More information on Cadillac can be found at media.cadillac.com.