In the first issue of the Scale Car Promo Newsletter, I'll share some of the Freebies that I've come across. This will be a mixed bag, some were actually "Free", some were send-in proofs, some actually cost money, not including Shipping and Handling. But the important thing is these are all cars you can't go to Wal-Mart and just buy, which makes them more collectible.

I think I got bit by the bug when Circle-K Convenience Stores offered a car for only $.99 when you fill-up with at least 8 gallons of gas. There were 4 cars, and when you asked, you could get a "free" display case. The cars were not very detailed - just the general paint scheme with the major sponsors added and none of the decals behind the front wheels or lettering on the tires were included. There was the Kodak #4, Kellogg's #5, Tide #10, and Slim Jim #44. The display case was a thin black plastic case and equally thin clear cover that had Circle-K vacuum formed in the top and was not what you would call optically clear. But it was a start. (Pictures and detailed information on each promo will be in upcoming issues)

About the same time, Shell was offering a similar deal with 3 different cars. Each was on a blister pack card with car and driver info on it too. There was the Shell #28 Indy racer, Shell #44 Busch GN and Interstate Batteries #18 NASCAR cars. They were finished a little better, with better graphics and Goodyear tires.

While we're on gas promos, there was the Amoco #93 and Mobil #12 25th Anniversary car. Amoco was a fairly detailed Racing Champions. The Mobil was a premium Team Caliber die-cast, and had rubber tires and everything. Of course the paint and graphics were equally very good. They both came in a box. Another boxed petroleum product promo was the Duralube #25 that was packaged with the product. The Action die-cast was a serialized limited Edition high quality collectible.

McDonalds's and other Fast Foods Kid's Meals include toys, the cars are usually far from scale or intentionally whimsical, or pullback toys, and not die-cast collectibles. The exception was the #44 HotWheels and the 3 different paint schemes on the #94 McDonald's car. The HotWheels made cars' paint was OK, but the majority of the graphics were stickers (and no tire lettering)! The cool thing was the coupon from co-sponsor Service Merchandise to buy the "Gold Car" and Transporter set for about half the normal selling price.

There are the usual send-in Freebies that usually require x number of Proofs of Purchase and some amount of S&H. Sometimes the Shipping and Handling costs more than one of the premier cars you can buy at the store! I just haven't been able to justify the M&M's or Pepsi offers, even though the Pepsi one is displayed in a "can". I did send away for the 4 car set of Jeff Gordon's cars, I remember that they were pretty expensive.

One of my favorite send-ins was the Kingsford #44 offer. They really only wanted Proofs of Purchases, no S&H. It was a nice car, good paint and graphics. Kellogg's has a current offer that is similar, only PoP required, the twist is you can get just the car for 3 PoPs, but for 6 PoPs you can get the car AND transporter. I'm still snacking on Honey-Nut Cheerios and Golden Grahams from the Dodge Promo, but I'm collecting Kellogg'sPoPs for this offer!

Speaking of Honey-Nut Cheerios and Golden Grahams, I loved the General Mills and Dodge "Countdown to Daytona" offer. I discovered it early enough to hoard 6 complete sets and 1 set of 4 cars. I just can't find another #92 Golden Graham box anywhere. I have 2 total sets where I removed the cereal, opened both ends of the box and "broke it down" semi-flat for easier storage. Another 2 complete sets: one all Honey-Nut Cheerios and one all Golden Grahams are just the "banner" cut from the top front of the box. I am planning on making a display of the four cars still running at the finish (Stacy Compton wasn't!) and of course commemorating Dale Earnhardt and Michael Waltrip. (What a shame that a great race driver wins his first race after so many starts, seconds after his boss and racing legend slams the wall and dies instantly!)

Of course my favorite Freebies are the ones you get with the product. For instance the Petty cars that came in Tide detergent. My biggest gripe there was the poor packaging, every car I dug out had Tide inside the package with the car. I opened the package to make sure the detergent wasn't caustic enough to damage the paint or tires, but now they're not MIP either. (I think I sent away for the '64 Belvedere, but never got my car - another reason to prefer the attached promos.) The cars were pretty good; the older ones didn't have that many sponsors or decals, so even though they are sparse, they are fairly accurate.

Another attached promo, are the 2 Excedrin paint scheme cars. These seem to be getting hard to find in my neck of the woods already. I'm trying to collect a couple of sets of Excedrin PM boxes with the Blue #92 PM Paint and matching boxes with the Maroon #57 Paint. I've also got a couple that don't have the matching product and Paint, and a couple of loose cars because I actually needed some pain reliever! These are great looking cars, detailed decals and graphics, detailed interiors and underside too. These are Racing Champion cars with some driver bio info on the box and marked "2001 Limited Edition".

Speaking of Pain Relievers, when I was looking for the Excedrin cars I came across a lone Bayer #33 car. I've contacted Bayer, and I'm trying to get some contacts with the Promo people. I have not found another Bayer promo car anywhere! So I think I caught the last one in all of Southwest Florida, that's one reason I'm starting this Newsletter, I want to know about these promos, so I can collect some of these!

Another promo that I caught the tail end of was a Rayovac Batteries #66. Buy 2 packs of batteries and get a car, there was only 1 car left, but I got it!

Like I said, I'm trying to get some contacts so I'll know in advance when a promo offer will be released. I'm also putting together a leaflet that I'm gonna try to get into the hands of the restocking technicians so they can email me when they open a carton of something and see collectible cars. I will forward the text I used if some of you would like to do the same thing, I'm sure different parts of the country get product at different times.

In future issues I will include pictures and more detailed information about the cars. As far as when I'll be publishing future issues; it will be sporadic, the first few may be more frequent as I go through my collection and show it off and detail what I know about the cars, after that it will drop off, to whenever a new promo is announced. As promos are announced I will gladly include the sources of information and give them due recognition, I will also include everyone who alerts me to a promo. I will be checking several NASCAR Fan sites to help talk about the detail of the cars, and of course I'll include their links for their help.

And now a word about my sponsors. The email list for this newsletter is made possible by a computer program developed by the company I work for. EPS by Harvey Software, Inc is basically an email autoresponder. In its' simplest form, that's when you get a response to an email before they can have a real person look at it, so at least you know they got it. It also allows me to create a mail list to send this newsletter to all you good folks. Check it and our multi-carrier-shipping program at www.HarveySoft.com.

Check out my other WebPages at http://members.safepages.com/genesis_art/INDEX.HTM. You'll see my other loves and hobbies (including my wife and her art, my guitars and digital camera, HO slotcars and trains and my shareware ScaleCalculator program, and other things.)

Well, now you know what this newsletter is all about. If you like it, let other people know, if you don't like it and you want to get off my mail list, send a response email to me with the subject = "REMOVE"

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