U.S. Cellular’s UR So Connected Tour’s Spring Break Charge-Up made a pit stop at UW-Platteville March 6, giving students the opportunity to win $25,000 worth of prizes.

“They contacted us back in January about this event,” Tameaka Bryant, Campus Programming and Relations event manager, said. “We didn’t know what it was at first but it sounded fun after they explained it to us.”

Photograph by Anthony Bauer
Nate Demski, sophomore business management major.

CPR co-sponsored the event, which took place on the Pioneer Student Center’s West Lawn from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Students were able to challenge each other at a bungee run or ball pit to win prizes that included about 400 video games, four X-Boxes, 200 backpacks and more.

“They are providing the games, which are kind of fun,” Valerie Wetzel, faculty adviser for CPR, said.

Karen Bublitz, an undeclared freshman, participated in the bungee run, where she received a little help in winning from Nick Howard, the U.S. Cellular’s UR So Connected tour manager.

Photograph by Anthony Bauer
Jordan Hahn, freshman communication technologies major.

“It looked fun and they were giving away free stuff,” Bublitz said. “[The bungee run] was a lot of fun.”

In order to participate in the activities, Bublitz, among other challengers, had to sign an injury wavier and then received a bracelet to show they had signed the waiver.

“There’s a chance that someone can get hurt, but it hasn’t happened yet,” Howard said.

While there were no U.S. Cellular sales people to be found at the event, U.S. Cellular phones were displayed around the activities. The phones were fully installed so people could play with them, make phones calls or surf the Internet.

“There are no sales people, so there are no pressures to purchase anything,” Howard said.

Photograph by Anthony Bauer
Amber Witthun, freshman physical education major.

Howard said that U.S. Cellular does these types of events to provide fun activities for college students around the Midwest. AMP Agency helped market this event.

Erin Keaveney, integrated publicist for AMP Agency, said that AMP is a promotional partner with U.S. Cellular. Because of this partnership, the agency offers a wide vareity of account services, marketing services, and PR support for the tour.
This was the first time these specific layouts were used for these activities in the Midwest. It took about four hours to setup and tear down for the six-hour event.

“U.S. Cellular has been doing different mobile tours for the past few years, but this is the first one of its kind in the sense that the games and executions are unique to the UR So Connected Spring Break Charge-Up,” Keaveney said.

Photograph by Anthony Bauer
Mindy Freivurder, sophomore psychology major.

Hanah Diebold, CPR event manager, estimated about 400 UW-P students either participated in the events or stopped to watch friends play against each other in the activities.

“It looked like everyone enjoyed themselves,” Bryant said