I remember that a few years ago, 7-Up had a marketing campaign to distribute one free ticket to space on the vessel that won the Ansari X-Prize. I believe it was some type of “golden ticket” inside the 12-pack boxes. It really interested me at the time, but I can’t remember when the flight was supposed to take place. One would think the winner would have been announced on the news.
Whatever happened to this? Did they cancel the contest? Is there any information on who won? Inquiring minds need to know!
Off topic: I’ve been lurking on this board for years and I’ve finally decided to register an account and maybe subscribe. I’m looking forward to finally contributing to this community, and I don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner. In other words, OMG F!R$T P0sT!!!
This campaign (here’s the 2004 press release from 7-Up) was similar to the bookings which Branson’s Virgin Galactic started to accept a few years ago: They were promising seats in flights which were not yet scheduled. This is why you never heard of the date the flight is supposed to take place - as of today, there is no company which is capable of offering commercial space travel to private individuals. What 7-Up promised in the sweepstakewas that as soon as there is a service which can carry their winner into space for money, they would buy him (or her) a ticket. In a few years, there might be the first commercial space flight, and I’m sure 7-Up will go to any lengths to secure their winner a seat, but as long as the service is not available, there’s not much they can do.
As for why the winner wasn’t publicly announced: Maybe 7-Up’s marketing managers are intentionally waiting for the day the first commercial space flight is announced, and present their winner together with the presentation of the flight itself. After all, presenting a winner and adding that he’ll go into space soon has a stringer advertising effec than presenting him and adding that he might go into space in a few years, subject to the availability of carriers.
