Lucerne®, Safeway's Exclusive Dairy Brand, Crowns Winner of the Eighth Annual Lucerne® The Art of Dairy™ Art Contest

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Jun 19, 2013, 12:00 ET

PLEASANTON, Calif., June19, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Lucerne^®, Safeway Inc.'s exclusive dairy brand, congratulates Kayla A. of Phoenix, Arizona for winning the $30,000 grand prize in the Eighth Annual Lucerne^® The Art of Dairy™ Art Contest. Students from Bellingham, Washington and La Veta, Colorado also took home prizes in one of the most unique and interactive art contests in the country.

Kayla, a sophomore at Northwest Christian School, receives $20,000 for her school's art department, plus $5,000 for herself and $5,000 for her art teacher.

The Lucerne^® The Art of Dairy™ art contest provides high school students the opportunity to make their artwork "legenDairy" on an unconventional canvas – a life-sized fiberglass cow. Since the inception of the Art of Dairy™ contest in 2005, Safeway has contributed over $373,000 to schools, teachers, and students. This year, over 6,500 entries were received from schools across the country.

Safeway's Lucerne^® brand provides students delicious nourishment before, during, and after school to feed the body and help fuel creative minds. Leveraging a brand new theme – "ImaginDairy Places" – students were encouraged to express their love of dairy by creating an imaginary world made up of their favorite dairy products on a cow-shaped template. From over 6,500 entries, nine finalists were chosen to transfer their designs to large fiberglass cow sculptures. Then, America decided the winner via online voting from April 17 thru May 17, 2013, while the finalist cows were on display in Safeway stores across the country.

About the Winners

Grand Prize Winner Kayla A. titled her design "Moovin' Along." On the inspiration for her design, Kayla wrote "Imagine hiking across ice cream mountains and whipped cream snow trying to reach the cherry on top of the sundae. Imagine floating down a river of strawberry milk in the creamy caverns."

The First Prize Winner is Rachel R. of Bellingham, Washington. She titled her design "Moochanical Moochine," and the design featured actual rivets bringing her machine to life. The Sehome High School senior wrote "The theme this year is ImaginDairy, so I connected the shape of the cow to an imaginary factory within the cow. Rachel won $5,000 for her school's art program and $2,500 each for herself and her teacher.

Honorable Achievement recipient Yul J. of La Veta, Colorado titled his design "The LegenDairy Valley." The student wrote "From the String Cheese Forest to the Milky Waters, the Chocolate Caverns to the Ice Cream Mountains, this land is made for you and me." Yul, a senior at La Veta School, won $1,000 each for himself and his teacher.

The following finalists will receive $500 gift cards:

Gissella M. – Weber Institute – Stockton, CA
Hagen A. – Northwest Career and Technical Academy – Las Vegas, NV
Sierra N. – Sandy High School – Sandy, OR
Melissa P. – Tinley Park High School – Tinley Park, IL
Riley K. – Loudoun Valley High School – Purcellville, VA
Nhung (Julie) L. – South Grand Prairie High School - Grand Prairie, TX

Additional prizes included:

$1,000 for Kearny High School of San Diego, California, the school with the most entries per capita
$100 Safeway gift cards to every 100,000^th voter

For past contest winners, entry forms, delicious recipes, information about Lucerne® and Official Rules, visit www.ArtofDairy.com.

About Safeway www.Safeway.com
Safeway Inc. is a Fortune 100 company and one of the largest food and drug retailers in North America, based on sales. The company operates 1,638 stores in the United States and western Canada and had annual sales of $44.2 billion in 2012. The company's common stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol SWY.