World’s Largest Rotating Globe, Yarmouth, ME

Eartha, the world’s largest rotating globe, is housed in an atrium at the headquarters of DeLorme, a company specializing in mapping and GPS and satellite technology. The structure took two years to build; it measures 41.5 feet in diameter, weighs approximately 5,600 pounds, and tilts at the same angle as the Earth, 23.5 degrees. The Guinness Book of World Records declared the globe the World’s Largest Revolving/Rotating Globe in 1999 and it still holds that record.  Visited August 2014.

Location: 2 DeLorme Drive, just off I-295 Exit 17 (Route 1)

The Old Lobster Fisherman, Boothbay Harbor, ME

At 15-feet tall, “The Old Lobster Fisherman” guards the entrance of Brown’s Wharf Inn. Visited August 2014.

Location: 121 Atlantic Ave.

Journey Withdrawal

It’s been a great ride, Dodge!  Since I found out about the three Journeys Dodge was hiding across America, I’ve been in seventh heaven.  The last two weeks have been a lot of fun for a roadie like me as I’ve scoured commercials for clues, tried to identify the road trip from pictures, participated in discussion boards with others in the hunt, and, of course, wrote posts for The Off Ramp.  I’ve had a week to think about the campaign since the last car was found and have some final thoughts . . .

I thought the search in the East was great!  It was extremely difficult, but that’s OK.  Finding a vehicle you can keep for free should be a challenge.  As you know, prior to the search there was mass speculation that the Journey would be hidden in the Ticonderoga, N.Y./Shoreham, Vt. area.  Instead, it moved to nearly 400 miles away, to the southern coast of Maine.  I think that Dodge probably did punt and move from its original location, and I thought the way the company did this was very creative.  I enjoyed the Saturday night and Sunday morning slide shows revealing views along the Journey’s path.  These slides are one of the main reasons I think Maine was an alternate location.  The pictures were not high quality and had been taken in the rain; because it had been raining in the area the couple of days leading up to the search, the pictures were probably taken last minute.  However, they provided an opportunity for extra investigative work for those of us playing from home.  One thing I especially liked about the final search was that, near the end, the clues shifted offline so that only those physically in the search could find them.

Of course, on the Dodge YouTube site discussion boards there were enough sour grapes to make a lot of batches of vinegar.  Many people were upset because of the apparent move of the final location and the fact that there were no clues in the original commercial or the video clues revealed the first day of the search that alluded to where the Journey ended up.  They were upset because they missed the slide shows and continued to search for the Journey in New York, Vermont and New Hampshire long after it was clear that it was in Maine.  Then there were those who were upset because Maine is so far away from everywhere else in the eastern region of the United States.  I’m sure that would be the case no matter where it was hidden — there will be those who will always be unhappy that it wasn’t in their backyard.

As for the Midwest controversy, that remains unanswered — at least, officially.  While questions are still being asked, talk on the Dodge discussion boards has started to turn away from any of the searches and onto general car talk, and the Facebook pages demanding answers and a “re-do” in Oklahoma have never gained much momentum.

Perhaps this is what Dodge had hoped would happen all along — that people would eventually move on to other things.  Or, Dodge may have been trying to avoid the “Streisand effect,” something public relations professionals have known about long before the Internet — bringing more attention to a problem by addressing it.  I agree that Dodge didn’t need to make an announcement on the nightly news — why bring the problem to the attention of millions who never heard about it in the first place?  However, I still think a posting on the discussion board where people were talking about it would have gone a long way in the goodwill category.

Finally, this was a marketing campaign, so how did it measure up?  Several  bloggers have expressed their opinions:

• Blogs on AdWeek and Business Insider talk about how risky stunts like this campaign can be.
• A marketing blog outlines the many things Dodge could’ve done to improve the marketing value of the campaign.
• Another marketing blog asks the question: “Awesome campaign regardless or too big of an oops?”

At the end of the day, I would judge the Journey contest a success . . .  IF the campaign’s objective was awareness.   The campaign certainly created a lot of buzz, both good and bad.  I think the campaign was also successful at getting people into the “World Wide World,” as stated in the commercial.  I read numerous accounts on the discussion boards of people traveling across country to participate in the searches or making it a family outing.

Will all of this translate into car sales though?  Hmmmmm — that may be a stretch.  I think it’s more likely to help out Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, because millions of people following the final search (which was the longest and probably had the most people watching) were exposed to some beautiful scenery they may not have known existed. For that, and the most fun I’ve had in a long time, I say “Thanks, Dodge.”

East Coast Search Recap

Well, that was an exciting 29 hours, Dodge!  In fact, it’s been an exciting Journey ever since I first saw that Route 66 sign on the commercial announcing the search for three Dodge Journeys hidden across the United States and, as the commercial said, “If you can find one, you can have one.”  By the time the final search came to the East, the momentum had reached a fever pitch.

The last Journey was found in a barn attached to a vacation property in Tenants Harbor, Maine.  It’s WAYYYYY out there!  It’s pretty much on a peninsula about halfway up the southern Maine coast.  The path there began nearly 500 miles earlier in Albany, N.Y.  That was the first of five video clues that were revealed one hour apart on the Dodge YouTube site.  The rest of the video clues led to Saratoga Springs, Lake George, Chestertown, and Schroon Lake, respectively.  (For summaries of each of the video clues, start here.)  Of course, those of us who had been deciphering the clues from the original commercial already knew the Journey was going to take that path.  In fact, we knew it was going to go even further east because of a photo Dodge released the night before the search officially began showing the ferry that crosses from Fort Ticonderoga to Vermont and a shot of the ferry landing in Vermont that appeared in the original commercial.  This is where it got interesting . . .

If you were to follow the road from the landing, Route 74, you would soon see an intersection that was also seen in the first video clue of the day (Route 74/73 and Route 22A).  At that location, there was a sign posted on a pole that read: “This isn’t the end.  It’s only the beginning.  We can’t wait to share where we went next.  The journey is within 350 miles from here.”  The clues continued with two slide shows at 6 p.m. Saturday and 9 a.m. Sunday showing places the Journey had passed on the way to its final destination.  Judging from the discussion on the Dodge YouTube site since the search ended, it appears a lot of people didn’t see these additional clues, which took searchers as far as Portland, Maine.  The final slide was a picture of the Time and Temperature Building there, except the word “CALL” appeared where the time and temperature usually does.  While this was part of an advertising campaign unrelated to the Dodge search, it actually led to the next round of clues.

Eventually the cameraman who was live at the location displayed a sign with a phone number.  It lacked an area code, but Maine only has one.  At this point, the contest left the armchair searchers behind and focused only on those who were physically in the hunt.  The phone number reached a recording that hinted at Red’s Eats in Wiscasset (of course, my good friend and fellow roadie, Sarah YO Cote, had figured that out much earlier when the cameraman ate a unique looking lobster roll for lunch).  When searchers got to Red’s, the “specials” sign in the window read “Life’s a journey, not a destination” along with a phone number.  And so it went — phone numbers leading to businesses with more clues, eventually leading nearly 80 miles further northeast to Rockland, Maine, where the final clue was in the window of a real estate office — a picture of the vacation property about 12 miles away.  You can see the location of clues from beginning to end here.

The first person to reach it was a young mother named Melissa.  Originally from Illinois, she recently moved to Virginia for her husband’s military assignment and made the trek by herself sleeping little, sometimes in her car on the side of the road.  Kudos to her!  She has been sharing her story on the Dodge YouTube site discussion board and it’s been an interesting one to read.

And so this journey comes to an end.  I do have some final thoughts about the East Coast search and the campaign in general, but I’ll save that for another post . . .