Put on your best Chiquita face!

What is it about Chiquita’s blue label that people find so intriguing? Is it because Chiquita bananas were the first food many kids got to hold and eat all by themselves? Or do they secretly want to be Miss Chiquita, the world’s first face on a bunch of bananas?

While most brands are hyper sensitive about brand image and have very strict guidelines on proper usage, the folks over at Chiquita Brands have an altogether different point of view when it comes to their beloved logo – that famous blue sticker that has adorned countless numbers of the world’s bananas for nearly 50 years.

The company created www.EatAChiquita.com, the award winning site that allows consumers to create their own Chiquita sticker “faces” based on the iconic blue Chiquita sticker. Since the site went live a few months ago, almost 500,000 people have visited and upwards of 25,000 different Chiquita sticker faces have been created and are available on the site. The company just launched Shop A Peel by Chiquita, a place where diehard Chiquita fans can go to customize a wide range of items from t-shirts and mouse pads, to postage stamps and skateboards, with their personalized sticker faces.

Chiquita has selected Zazzle.com to provide its custom gear shop to more than half a million fans. I was sent a Mr. Chimp t-shirt and love it! Definitely a unique design, and it’s a high-quality tee. The Shop A Peel store is closely linked to the www.EatAChiquita.com site, which also offers a fun Sticker Studio, Photo Customizer, Arcade, Cinema, Fruit Stand and a link to Chiquita’s Facebook fan page. In the Sticker Studio, you can create your own Chiquita sticker, save it, and then use it on a variety of Zazzle merchandise. My daughter and I came up with the design to the right. It’s pretty neat. Visit www.EatAChiquita.com and www.Zazzle.com/ShopAPeel to learn more!

Would you like to win a t-shirt just like mine, pictured to the right? To enter, please leave a comment below. Go bananas!

For extra entries:

• Subscribe to my feed by feed reader or email (or let me know if you already do).
• Follow me on Twitter (@OhMariana) and tweet about this giveaway (one time): Go bananas! Win a fun Chiquita tee – http://tinyurl.com/y6btlp2 #RWNH (pls RT)
• Link to me in your sidebar or blog roll. Feel free to grab my button (at the bottom of the page).

I was provided with a complimentary t-shirt, pictured above, for sharing this information. T-shirt size is up to the sponsor, but I believe the prize will be a Medium. Contest ends April 25th, 2010 11:59 pm EST. US entries only. One person per household may enter. Leave a separate comment for each entry & a valid email address. Winner, chosen at random, has 3 days to claim their prize.

A screenshot of the Shop A Peel store:

Scroll down to the bottom of the page for a list of all my latest giveaways!