Although he finished second in this year's hotdog eating competition, next to Joey Chestnut (who finished 68 hotdogs in 10 minutes), Takeru "Tsunami" Kobayashi remains popular, holding the record for six straight years. Competitive eating then became a growing global phenomenon, attracting over 50,000 people, and is covered by ESPN on the day of the finals.
In the United States and Japan, competitive eating is treated as a real sport because it requires training, discipline and a regimen to be able to compete. We have been dreaming of this project since 2002, since we know customers love our hotdogs, and with the same PR agency. Five years later, we launched it with an internal campaign, with our store managers, area managers and district managers, and we knew it was a hit. Actually, when we first pitched the concept, everyone's reaction was the same: excited! The same was true for the media when we launched it last July 4 at the Rockwell Tent for an exclusive media launch.
It was newsworthy: Filipinos love to eat, it's a first, the biggest in Southeast asia, and was launched the same day Joey Chestnut won his second International Federation of Competitive Eaters champion for Nathan's. Aside from fried chicken and hamburger, the Americans gave us our love for hotdogs, even if,as Kuya Kim of Umagang Kayganda says, it in fact, came from Germany. We know we couldn't get Kobayashi, but we flew in Tom "Goose" Gilbert, who won the 2006 Italian Sausage eating contest, and has several other titles under his belt. Without Tom showcasing how the sports is done, it would have been anti-climactic. He finished 10 hotdogs in 3 minutes 27 seconds, and we all watched in amazement as buns disappeared in a few gulps.
We were with Tom for the duration of his stay here, and he told us a funny story about how he go into it. He said he watched an event, and then said to himself, " How cool and disgusting!.... I could do that." He trains once a month by eating oats, or cabbage (4 kilos) or drinking gallons of water. The trick to this competition, as he points out, is training the stomach to expand. That is why, if you look at the champions, they are not heavy at all.
So in between meeting with the project team, pitching the project to top management, bidding the project out, working on the creatives, talking to our operations team who will do the execution, the weekly updates and deadlines, we are almost there. We launched the competition June 26, and as of July 18 we have over 554 (successful) participants, with some multiple entries. There is this high school student in our Annapolis store, Tony Shu, whose name you will see thrice in that store's Leader Board. He keeps trying until he beats his own record. Our best record so far is from John Paul Aragoncillo in Mc Kinley Hills (are you a call center agent?) who has a time of 1 minute 16 seconds. Raymond Bagoncia, whose entry appears in our Sunny Brooke store probably came in with a group of friends because all four of them clocked in under 2 minutes.
On Facebook I met Revo Naval who recorded his try in a Manansala store and got over 63 comments, and got some of his friends to try.
"I'll try to beat that time. ;)
looking strong though."
"hahahahahha... the security guard takin a video too! HAHA"
"kala ko sinasawsaw mo yung bun para mas malasa =))"
"i thought we're gonna do this?tara!!part 2 for you!!game!"
"wahahaha!!! go rev! kulet mo!"
"the record is at 2 minutes??? ima smoke out and give that a shot!"
"hahahah ! this would have been so funny if you actually puked ! ahhaha woo go rev"
"JOHNNYVERSE VS DJ ACE VS REVOLUTION VS BIGBOY CHENG"
TonyToni Bueno at 4:33am July 13
"Hayden Kho is joining this contest! Mahilig sa pakwan, let's see if hotdogs are his weakness!
Rev: We interviewed Thomas GOOSE MAN Gilbert who did the 5 hotdogs in 1mins 31sec, obviously he cant join!! Will post the video after we air the episode on mtv!"
http://foodiestation.blogspot.com/2009/07/7-elevens-1st-big-bite-national-hotdog.html
Santi Santos
TonyToni Bueno is, of course TonyToni of Boys Night Out who taped a segment for their MTV show Hanging Out With The Boys which aired last night. I thought they'd catch my answer to Sam YG's question on, " Are you single and ready to mingle?" , and his subsequent "flavor of sensation" demo, but thank God, no.
We are cooking up something for the semifinals and of course, the Bonggang Bonggang Finals will be held at the Trinoma Activity Center on August 29, Saturday, 3-5 PM with the Boys Night Out as hosts. In the meantime, you can still join. Just go to any of our 400 stores from Baguio to Lipa, buy the Big Bite Match Combo pack and eat as fast as you can!
If you have pictures or videos of your friends joining the competition, please send them over. I'd love to see them- the videos and the Big Bite fans. Let's make it fun on August 29,ok? I promise you'd have a great time.
Lastly, check out all promo details on www.eatingmachinesphilippines.com
XOXO,
A
P.S.Check out www.eatingmachinesphilippines.com
P.P.S. I need volunteers for the grand finals side events- Slurpee drinking contest, and a Butong Pakwan marathon (pramis, totoo!)
