For the past three months, Christian Blatner has traveled over 12,000 miles through 13 different states. But he didn’t do it in a car — he has been driving a 27-foot hot dog on wheels through cities and down highways in the Northeast.

Blatner is one of 12 recent college graduates hired to drive a Weinermobile, the promotional vehicle for Oscar Mayer, shaped like a giant hot dog. There are six Weinermobiles traveling across the country in their respective regions, stopping in various locations for the public to enjoy. On Tuesday, Blatner’s mobile was parked on the Syracuse University campus outside of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.

“It’s an American icon,” Blatner said. “Everyone knows it. We are a PR agency on wheels — we talk to people all day, we do a lot with the media.”

Weinermobiles have been racking up publicity for Oscar Mayer for 80 years, since 1936 when Carl Mayer, Oscar’s nephew, created the first vehicle. For the past 29 years, the company has recruited recently-graduated college students to be a “hot dogger,” a driver of one of the trucks, Blatner said.

He was selected out of about 12,000 people who applied for one of the coveted positions. And to Blatner, there’s no better job he could have taken.

“I’m getting paid to travel across the country,” he said.

The other driver of the Weinermobile, Kayla Kawalec, is the one who arranged for them to make a stop on the SU campus.

Kawalec had met Les Rose, a broadcast and digital journalism professor in Newhouse, during her time as a student at the University of Florida. When she found out her Weinermobile would be visiting the Syracuse area, she told him she could potentially drive over to SU when they had free time. They arranged for the Weinermobile to park on campus for several hours for students to see and enjoy.

Kawalec said that the Weinermobile’s main purpose is to set up at retail events where Oscar Mayer products are sold, allowing people to play games, take photos and sometimes even see the inside of the vehicle.

She said the mobiles also participate in fairs, festivals and parades. While the main purpose of the Weinermobiles is to promote Oscar Mayer, both Kawalec and Blatner stressed that they are also intended to bring joy and excitement to people across the country.

“A lot of people will say they saw it at their local parade when they were 10 and now they’re 60 and haven’t seen it since,” Blatner said. “It’s super nostalgic and brings them back to childhood. We hear those memories and are also making new memories for the 5-year-old walking up to the mobile for first time. It really transcends all generations.”

Blatner said this is not the first time a Weinermobile has been on a college campus. Since the drivers are all recent graduates, they visit campuses frequently in the second half of the year to recruit for their positions. He said they will often go in and speak at career fairs, or to classrooms of marketing, advertising, public relations and journalism students.

He said the job responsibilities typically attract students interested in these fields — Blatner was a journalism student himself — but that anyone with an affinity for talking to people, traveling and spreading enthusiasm could be right for the job.

Blatner and Kawalec will be continuing the Weinermobile’s journey around Syracuse and its surrounding areas in the next few days. On Thursday, they will be parked from 12-5 p.m. in the East Syracuse Walmart located on Basile Rowe. On Friday, they will visit the Walmart on East Avenue in Central Square, and then they will be bringing the festivities to Cicero on Sunday at the Walmart on Brewerton Road.

Kawalec is especially glad they were able to make this stop on the SU campus.

“We are excited we were able to come onto campus today and surprise everyone and spread joy,” she said. “The Weinermobile is about surprises and bringing it places you wouldn’t expect and just making peoples’ day.”

Published on October 4, 2016 at 10:05 pm

Contact: ajboghos@syr.edu