I am not usually thinking about winning a trip in the morning, even if I have had my coffee. I’m usually thinking about getting Isaac to school on time or the many things I need to do that day work- or school- or soccer-wise or how really and truly I am going to get a handle on my filing system one of these days or all of the above and then some. That’s my interior monologue most mornings.
This morning when I was packing Isaac’s lunch I noticed a shiny little flap of a thing on the Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies. INSTANTLY WIN A European Adventure, the shiny little flap of a thing beckoned. It turns out, per Pepperidge Farm’s Art of the Cookie website, that you only win if you find a golden cup and a winning card in a package of cookies. This despite the claim NO PURCHASE REQUIRED. Which isn’t the case: a purchase is so required to win the Grand Prize, a two-week vacation in Europe, to cookie sister cities Geneva, Brussels (my favorite, sigh), Milano and Bordeaux. Unless you shoplift the damn things.
Now, you can win prizes like luggage if you enter online. No purchase required there. Otherwise, I’ll be buying packages of cookies between now and when the sweeps closes March 15 next year. Oh, wait. I’ve been foiled again by the Official Rules. You can enter by mail! As many times as you like! Here we go: 2) To play the offline game without purchasing cookies: Print your name, address, email address (optional), and phone number, on a 3x5 piece of paper and mail, in an envelope with proper postage affixed, to: European Adventure, PO Box 861, Bethpage, NY 11714-0861. Mail-in requests must be postmarked by 3/15/07 and received by 3/22/07 in order to be eligible. VT residents may omit return postage.
If you want to go the Willy Wonka route (after all, this is a derivative approach), here are the details, also from the Official Rules.
1) Look for the European Adventure Instant Winner Game Piece (“Game Piece”) that can be found in specially marked 4.9 oz – 9.2 oz packages of the following Pepperidge Farm cookies: Bordeaux®, Brussels®, Mint Brussels®, Geneva®, Lido®, Milano®, Double Chocolate Milano®, Mint Milano®, Raspberry Milano®, Orange Milano®, French Vanilla Milano®, Black & White Milano®, Amaretto Milano®, Milk Chocolate Milano®, Chocolate Chunk - Milk Chocolate Macadamia - Sausalito®, Dark Chocolate Chunk – Nantucket™, White Chocolate Macadamia – Tahoe®, Dark Chocolate Pecan – Chesapeake™, Double Chocolate, Mint Dark Chocolate, Soft Baked – Milk Chocolate Macadamia – Sausalito, Dark Chocolate Chunk – Nantucket, Oatmeal Raisin, Dark Chocolate Brownie – Captiva, Sugar, Snickerdoodle, Oatmeal Cranberry, Milk Chocolate Caramel, Chocolate Delights – Chocolate Raspberry Rialto, Triple Chocolate Seville, Chocolate Toffee Marbella, Mini Brussels®, Mini Milano®, Mini Mint Milano®, Mini Chessman, and Mini Chocolate Chunk- Sausalito. To see if you have won the Grand Prize, open the package, and look for the “Golden Cups”. If your package contains cookie cups (the cup inside the package that the cookies rest in) that are “golden”, and game card, you are an instant winner, subject to verification. Non-winning packages will not contain a game card and golden cookie cups.