Jeep(R) Receives Billboard Award for Sponsorship of Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's Soul2Soul Tour 2007

Jeep(R) Receives Billboard Award for Sponsorship of Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's Soul2Soul Tour 2007

AUBURN HILLS, Mich., Nov. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- The Jeep(R) brand celebrated the culmination of a successful year-long partnership with Tim McGraw and Faith Hill as the winner of Billboard's inaugural Billboard Concert Marketing & Promotion award for its sponsorship of "Jeep presents Soul2Soul Tour 2007."

The award was presented Nov. 15 in New York as part of the 2007 Billboard Touring Conference, which honored the industry's top artists, venues and professionals for the year, based on the Billboard Boxscore chart.

The Billboard Concert Marketing & Promotion award, presented for the first time this year, is the only award (outside of the Humanitarian and Legend awards) not decided by Billboard Boxscore, but rather by more than 40,000 online votes at Billboard.com and Billboard.biz through Oct. 31. The award recognized a sponsorship or promotion that achieved its marketing goals in a quantifiable way, benefited the concert industry at large by stimulating live event attendance and provided a value to music fans.

The partnership between the Grammy award-winning artists and the Jeep brand was built on the couple's personal story of their "Date Jeep," a red 1978 Jeep CJ in which McGraw and Hill decided to start a life together.

As a result of their personal experience with Jeep, the relationship grew to beyond just a tour sponsorship to include an online contest for Jeep enthusiasts to share their own stories, vehicle displays and videos produced to support the tour, the auction of a 2007 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited with proceeds benefiting the couple's Neighbor's Keeper Foundation, a download of an exclusive McGraw song on the Jeep brand Web site and McGraw's performance at the brand's annual owner event, Camp Jeep.

"Tim and Faith's personal story about how the Jeep brand has been part of their lives made this partnership a natural for us," said John Plecha, Director - Jeep Brand Marketing and Global Communications. "It made perfect sense to find ways to extend the relationship to our owners. It has been our pleasure to be associated with these two very talented artists."

Helping the Jeep brand activate all of the elements of the sponsorship were Mac Presents, George P. Johnson Company, BBDO Detroit and Organic.

The "Jeep presents Soul2Soul Tour 2007" played 44 concerts in 37 cities in the U.S. and Canada from June through August and showcased up-and-coming country stars Halfway to Hazard, Lance Miller, Lori McKenna and Taylor Swift.

In addition to the Jeep brand, the other nominees were the Jagermeister Mobile Stage, Summerfest's U.S. Cellular Connection Stage, BlackBerry- sponsored John Mayer 2007 Tour, Hershey's S'more Access to Brad Paisley and Verizon Wireless' sponsorship of Fergie's tour.

About the Jeep Brand

The Jeep brand expanded to seven nameplates in the 2007 model year, the most available to retail consumers at one time in the brand's 66-year history. With the introduction of the all-new 2008 Jeep Liberty mid-size sport-utility vehicle (SUV), the Jeep brand offers customers the freshest, most capable and widest range of sport-utility vehicles under one brand in the industry.

At the start of 2004, the brand's trio of tough, capable, rugged SUVs included the venerable Jeep Grand Cherokee, Jeep Liberty (Cherokee outside North America) and the icon of the brand, the Jeep Wrangler. The Jeep Commander was introduced in 2005 followed in 2006 by the all-new Jeep Wrangler. Three more all-new Jeep vehicles: Jeep Patriot, Jeep Compass and the four-door Jeep Wrangler Unlimited also made their debut in the 2006 calendar year.

First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact:

Source: Chrysler LLC

CONTACT: Jodi Tinson, +1-248-512-2944 (office), +1-586-219-0677 (cell),
jt658@chrysler.com, or Carrie McElwee, +1-248-512-2664 (office),
+1-248-613-7752 (cell), cm63@chrysler.com, both of Chrysler

Web site:

http://www.chrysler.com/

NOTE TO EDITORS: For more information, please visit the Chrysler media site at http://cgmedia.daimlerchrysler.com.

For more information about 2007 labor negotiations, please visit http://www.chryslerlabortalks07.com.

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