The Planter’s NUTMobile Returns to Campus

Nicole Aponte, SYRACUSE, N.Y. – The Peanutters Team stopped at Syracuse University during their nationwide salty tour this past week to recruit for a new Public Relations team to run the NUTmobile in the coming year. This team drives around in a 26-foot long peanut shaped mobile spreading “miles of smiles” across the country.

The Peanutters Team looks for candidates who are adventurous, independent, and love to travel. This job is not the typical first job right-out-of-college, but 2020 SU Graduate Allyson Toolan explains that she didn’t know that being on the Peanutters team was even an opportunity. “The more I learned about the job, the more I knew that this was the only job that I wanted to do outside of college.”

While this is certainly a nutty job to have, the pandemic has created more challengesnthan previous years. As COVID-19 cases rose across the states, the Peanutters team adapted to more community-based events such as drive-by events, appearances at farmers markets, visiting nursing homes, and operating solely out of the NUTmobile.

Looking back on the 2020 year, Allyson’s favorite pandemic moment was when the team visited nursing homes weekly. “Those were always my favorite visits because people in nursing homes are often forgotten about, but during the pandemic they were also isolated.” Being able to go to nursing homes and bring them something to smile about is something that “Almond Ally” will never forget.

Allyson is joined by eight other recent college graduates, including Grace “Go Nuts” Noice. Grace expressed that she just happened to stumble across the job on Instagram, but is glad she did. “My job is to make people smile, and in-turn that has made me smile more.” Grace has grown a lot since her start as a Peanutter, and has become more confident as she is pushed to try new things professionally – sales, business relations, and event coordinating. “This is an amazing opportunity for any young professional – you can see the country and become family with a weird group of people driving food-shaped vehicles. I would recommend it to anyone.”

If you are interested in applying to be on the next team of Peanutters, be sure to check out www.plantersnutmobile.com for more information. To see where the NUTmobile is headed next, updates are posted to @NUTmobile_Tour on Twitter. This is something you wal-NUT want to miss.