Five-Acre Crop Circle Welcomes American Idol to Omaha

Five-Acre Crop Circle Welcomes American Idol to Omaha

Nebraska Advertising/PR Agency's Idea Becomes American Idol's 'Big Reveal' for the Omaha Auditions Show

OMAHA, Neb., Jan. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Idol cast, crew and thousands of contestants got a very big heartland welcome to Omaha -- a crop circle stretched across five acres of corn saying, "Welcome to Omaha, American Idol." The welcome, dubbed by American Idol as Omaha's "Big Reveal" was officially extended Tuesday night from hundreds of feet in the air during the national broadcast of American Idol's Omaha auditions show.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080130/LAW014)

"We came up with the idea to have our agency make a crop circle to greet American Idol to our city," says Jennifer Windrum, public relations manager at Swanson Russell Associates. "We were in discussions with American Idol for a separate project for a client and told senior producer, Patrick Lynn, to be on the look-out for our green and yellow message. To our surprise, Lynn said, 'You've got to be kidding me. I'm a crop circle freak. If you guys can pull this off, I want to use it in my show.'"

The PR team of Swanson Russell Associates (SRA), Nebraska's largest marketing communications agency, had two weeks to create the crop circle for American Idol's "Miami-Vice" style helicopter shoot.

"American Idol's interest in our crop circle, potentially using it as the opening shot of the Omaha auditions show and keeping the "Big Reveal" a secret from everyone obviously turbo-charged the stakes of our original plan a million-fold," says Windrum. "We told Lynn we would make it happen, and we did."

The SRA PR team quickly moved into logistics mode. The team's first two steps were the most critical: Finding someone to make the crop circle, finding a suitable cornfield and finding a land owner willing to let SRA use it.

"There were some interesting challenges, but we prepared to expect the unexpected," says Windrum. "This was a tremendous opportunity to welcome American Idol to the cosmopolitan city Omaha truly is. We gave agriculture, a tremendous economic driver for our state, a modern twist by carving the American Idol logo into a cornfield the size of five football fields. Now that's one mighty welcome mat."

To see behind-the-scenes videos of Swanson Russell Associates working with American Idol, including the making of the crop circle, go to http://www.sramarketing.com/americanidol.

First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact:

Photo: NewsCom:

http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080130/LAW014
AP Archive:

http://photoarchive.ap.org/
AP PhotoExpress Network: PRN1
PRN Photo Desk, photodesk@prnewswire.com
Source: Swanson Russell Associates

CONTACT: Jennifer Windrum of Swanson Russell Associates,
+1-402-492-3220, jenniferw@sramarketing.com

Web site: http://www.sramarketing.com/americanidol

-------
Profile: intent