A) Pepsi – Gatorade World Cup of Hockey

This contest brought new meaning to the phrase ‘HE SHOOTS, HE SCORES!’ You’re damn straight you score. If World Cup hockey fans correctly guessed the period and time

(down to the second) of a team Canada ‘winning goal’ they became eligible to win a

million bucks. Not bad for a night of watching Canada’s favourite pastime and swilling beer (or hopefully Gatorade or Pepsi in this case).

But talking about going that extra mile, along with coming up with this idea where

participants registered online, Toronto-based promotional agency Capital C also promoted the contest around Gatorade’ s new Team Canada Red Rush formula and packaging.

B) CIBC Investor’s Edge Market Challenge

You know that old saying – takes money to make money? Yeah, well, toss that adage out. ‘Cause here comes CIBC Investor’s Edge Market Challenge, in association with AOL Canada – where you get $100,000 in virtual money to buy and sell stocks in an online game. But here’s the best part…since it’s virtual cash, you don’t lose a cent, but if your portfolio performs the best over the four-week round you’re eligible for a cool $10,000 (in real dineros!) And if the 10k isn’t in your future, you can still win cool swag like an iPod Mini or a one-year AOL Max subscription in random weekly draws.

A first-time contest affair for AOL and CIBC, the project was a collaborative effort with creative being driven by Toronto-based Publicis AD David Adams and writer Jim Borwick. The lowdown on this contest was pushed out via outdoor, print and online properties. The contest runs from now until the end of November.

C) Design the next box of Life Cereal

Forget the usual tableau kids use as a blank canvas – you know, the wall, a coffee table, the kitchen floor… Oh and while they’re creating their ‘art’ replace their crayons with some cereal. What? Yup, Life Cereal’s contest has parents throwing out their ‘Don’t play with your food’ speech. Using the

actual cereal, Life got kids to send in their uniquely textured artwork to be possibly featured on their cereal box.

The creative team at Toronto-based Downtown Partners, led by CD Dan Pawych and AD Craig Markou, conceived the national campaign, which began as a print ad promotion to engage kids and parents to interact with Life in an interesting way before morphing into this contest.

The project launched in May and the promotion ends this month with winners’ artwork featured on the face of Life Cereal boxes starting in March. How’s that for breaking all the rules?