Published: July 21, 2009 04:57 pm      

BILLS: T.O's cereal hopes to be the new Flutie Flakes

Bills fans, getchya milk ready.

Terrell Owens has his own reality television show and millions of followers on Twitter and, now, his own cereal. T.O.’s — as his cereal is called — will be coming to a Tops store near you, if they haven’t already.

PLB Sports, the Pittsburgh-based firm that introduced Flutie Flakes a decade ago, this week began rolling out Owens’ cereal, which will be sold exclusively in Tops stores.

Made of honey nut toasted oats, T.O.’s come in a collector’s box that features Owens on the cover. On the back is an image of a Bills helmet-clad Owens pouring the cereal onto his face, paying homage to his catch phrase, “Getchya popcorn ready.”

Although the side panel of the cereal box includes information on the star receiver’s Catch a Dream Foundation. Owens' contract does not specify whether any proceeds will benefit the foundation, said Ty Ballou, president of PLB Sports.

PLB Sports will hold an official unveiling at a Tops in Fairport next week to coincide with Bills training camp at St. John Fisher College. The company sent out an invitation on Facebook to the cereal unveiling next week, and is also selling boxes of T.O.’s on its Web site, PLBSports.com, for $5 for two boxes; they are the same price at Tops.

“T.O. certainly does a very good job of marketing himself, and it was a good fit,” Ballou said. “We have the right athlete and the right marketplace.”

Ballou said he approached Owens’ agent, Drew Rosenhaus, shortly after the Bills signed the veteran receiver in March. Owens liked the idea, and the plan was finalized within a matter of days.

The timing, Ballou said, is perfect. Bills training camp begins this weekend, and Owens’ reality series, “The TO Show,” premiered Monday on VH1, and he recently appeared on the ABC reality show “The Superstars” with supermodel Joanna Krupa.

While it’s too soon to tell if T.O.’s will surpass the success of Flutie Flakes, which sold nearly 3 million boxes and catapulted PLB Sports from a three-employee operation into a major sports and celebrity-endorsed product company, Ballou is hoping to at least break into the six-figure mark in the number sold. For now, PLB Sports is printing 25,000 boxes.

“I have no idea,” Ballou said when asked what his expectations are for T.O.’s. “We hoped to sell 25,000 boxes of Flutie Flakes. We sold just under 3 million, and that all started in Buffalo and with Tops.”

Tops, Ballou said, was the only local retailer that supported the idea of Flutie Flakes from the start, and that’s why for now, Owens’ cereal will be sold only in Tops stores and online.

Of course, the success of T.O.’s will depend largely on whether Owens remains healthy through training camp and how the Bills fare in their season opener on a Monday night against the New England Patriots.

“The buzz is building like it did 10 years ago,” Ballou, 53, said. “But they have to win, and Terrell has to play like a top five wide receiver.”

If that happens, sales of T.O.’s could soar. “When Doug Flutie got into (his first Bills game), he scored a typical Flutie touchdown where he ran like 40 yards for a 5-yard gain,” Ballou said. “The next day, we had orders for four truckloads of cereal.”

Boxes of Flutie Flakes, the sales of which benefited his Doug Flutie Jr. Foundation for Autism, can still be found on eBay. “It was a dream come true,” Ballou said of the impact Flutie Flakes had on his company. “That was a Godsend for us. There truly is not a better market for us than Buffalo and upstate New York,” he said.

Owens has come to Buffalo with much fanfare. Hundreds showed up at the Buffalo Niagara International Airport to greet him when he first arrived, and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown presented Owens a key to the city.

Contact reporter David J. Hill at 693-1000, ext. 115.