Tag: Planters Peanuts

Omaha Interview: Tania Castro from the Planters Nutmobile

OmahaNebraska.com Interview with Tania Castro from the Planters Nutmobile at Hy-Vee

Tanya Castro in front of the Planters Nutmobile at Hy-Vee

How long have you been with the Nutmobile?

So, I started with Katie and Mason on June 1st. We met May 31st. June 1st was our first day on the job. We trained for about nine days in Austin, Minnesota. We like to call it “Peanut Prep” and after the nine days we hit the road.

Now I understand the meaning of ”class”. So you are Class 10 (Tenth group to graduate from “Peanut Prep”)...

Yes, Class 10.

What did you do before this? How did you get this job?

So I’m a little different than Mason and Katie. They just graduated from college in May. I actually graduated college in December of 2021. After that, I started working for the government. I worked for a government agency in southern Nevada that did all public transportation, roadway planning… Funny story, one day I was picking up lunch from that job in Las Vegas and the Nutmobile passed me. And I was like, “This is probably the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.” So, I snapped a picture of it. I posted it on my Instagram. My friend responded that it’s the Nutmobile, so I started doing research on it. And I came across their TikTok and Class 9 was doing really well with it. This seems like fun. Luckily, they were accepting applications at the time, so I decided to apply and here I am.

What’s it made of?

The outside is made out of fiberglass and pool noodles. If anybody ever comes across the Nutmobile, you’ll see the ridges. Those are actually pool noodles covered in fiberglass.

Yes, it’s definitely conversation starter.

What’s the engine or the rest of it?

So it’s built on a 2017 Isuzu chassis. That’s the base of it. And then they built the nut on top of it.

And then 2017 … and Class 10…[Five year old Nutmobile vs ten years of Peanutters-What’s missing?]

Yes.

What happened?

Planters used to be owned by Kraft Heinz before this.

When it was owned by Kraft Heinz there were three Nutmobiles on the road. So, there were more Peanutters than three when Hormel adopted the program and we stuck with this one. So, if you ever come across the Nutmobile, this is the only one.

What did you study at school?

I did journalism with a concentration in Marketing, a minor in Business Marketing and the second degree in Spanish.

Wow.

If anybody’s interested in driving the Nutmobile and applications open back up, I say go for it. Honestly, it’s an experience of a lifetime. You’ll get to save this for the rest of your life. You get to drive a giant peanut across the United States and you get to visit so many places in so many communities. There’s definitely a great opportunity.

So all the 48 continental states?

We’re trying to get to 48.

Do you collect anything from all these states?

I do! I collect magnets. So, growing up, my grandma always had her magnets on her fridge. My uncle traveled a lot when he was younger, so he would bring her magnets back. Everywhere that I go, I buy a magnet.

That’s really cool.

Thank you.

Yeah, so I do magnets. Katie does stickers and Mason is trying to do hats. So, we’re trying to see how many hats he can collect on the road.

We were talking about it earlier today and he has about 20 so far. We’ll see how many he ends up with.

I think about a couple times a week, how crazy it is that if I didn’t leave work that day to get lunch…so I am very grateful.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Omaha Interview: Katie Chesebro from the Planters Nutmobile.

OmahaNebraska.com Interview with Katie Chesebro from the Planters Nutmobile at Hollywood Candy in the Old Market

Katie Chesebro in front of the Planters Nutmobile at Hy-Vee

They call me Cashew Katie.

That’s a good one.

Yeah, love it.

What’s your favorite nut?

I love the honey roasted peanuts. They’re probably my favorite, but if you have not tried [them] our dill pickle cashews are delicious. They’re so yummy. So, I like it a lot. We have some trail mixes out there. We have new cashew flavor coming out. So, lots of delicious exciting things, for sure.

What brings you to Omaha?

So I guess a little background of the automobile… Me, Tanya and Mason, we travel the United States from June to June. We’re class 10 of the Planters Peanutters. We hopefully will travel 48 out of 50 states. And so, Nebraska, we were looking at where to stop in Nebraska and Omaha seems pretty attractive to us. We stopped here and Hormel (owns Planters) has a plant here too. We were at Papillion Foods a couple days ago. Check out there, and yeah, now we’re just hanging out in Omaha. So, I guess the people [and the] big city life brought us here.

We really enjoy Omaha and glad we are here too. How did you come to work at the Nutmobile and what did you do before?

Good question! So, I actually went to school at the University of Wisconsin, Madison before this, and I was kind of hitting a point senior year where everyone was asking me what I’m doing next year, and I honestly had no idea. And so, an ad came across my Facebook. My mom was friends with someone who works at Hormel in promoting this job opportunity. And I just got so excited. So that became my Plan A and my dream job that I really wanted to strive for. So, applications opened in January. From there I submit a cover letter, resume, a minute long video of why I would be better, which was my favorite part of the application, and a basic application. And from there I went through an interview process and here we are.

What did you say that made you the perfect Peanutter?

So in college, I had the opportunity to put on a couple of bigger campus events as well as I worked at a radio station and was on the road with them quite a bit, talking to people going to various events, connecting with people getting people to smile, which is exactly what the job is, as well. I actually worked at a car dealership for five years throughout college. And so, I think the driving experience really helped me to handle such a big vehicle. 26 feet long and 11 and a half tall. It’s a pretty big vehicle which I think oddly enough of my experience lined up and I was excited about it, which I think made me the perfect candidate to be the next Peanutter.

That’s pretty cool.

It’s nutty for sure…

Gotta have a lot of puns.

Oh, yeah. My favorite I think is every time people leave, I always say ,“Cashew you later.” Oh, yeah, you know, and so it takes a minute for people to get it sometimes, but when they do I get lots of smiles.

We go we try to go to sporting events, minor league baseball games and stuff like that because what more of perfect a combo is peanuts in sports, you know? They’re a good snack. They’re healthy. So I love that kind of stuff.

Maybe gaming and programming competitions, because snacks are really big… What is in your Nutmobile?

Inside the Nutmobile we have six seats. The seats are embroidered with Mr. Peanut on them and a lot of people describe them as like they’re plane seats, but pretty comfy, so we have six of those on the inside. We also have a timeline of Mr. Peanut on the ceiling, so that’s pretty cool. Starts at 1919 when Mr. Peanut first arrived on packaging today with all the different Mr. Peanuts which is pretty fun. I think there’s like 20 on the ceiling.

Wow.

Obviously, cupholders. We have a TV. We call it our peanut bar with what’s underneath the TV as well as we have a cashew closet in the back and that’s where Mr. Peanut sleeps. He stays back there. Yeah, we get to travel with the one and only Mr. P. But that’s about a third of the vehicle. His bedroom.

Why did you pick here? Did you talk to Hollywood [Candy] ahead?

It’s, I mean when we’re in new cities, we just kind of asked people for recommendations. Honesty, the last class came here and they were like you have to check out candy store. It’s pretty cool…We love seeing cool things. And also, if you stop, you’re going  [to] stop and eat candy too. I think we’re trying to help out the local businesses as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.