Brooks: The coolest thing made in Minnesota? This contest winner will stick with you

Minnesota gave the world water skis, rollerblades and deep-fried ranch dressing. You’re welcome.

But what, the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce wondered, is the coolest thing Minnesota is manufacturing right now? This week, we got the answer.

Scotch tape.

Specifically, 3M’s Scotch Magic Tape.

For months, the chamber has pitted beloved Minnesota-made products against each other in a battle for bragging rights. By the fifth round, it was a four-way fight between a Red Wing boot; an installation St. Paul’s Midwest Floating Island built to recreate Baltimore’s long-gone salt marshes; an all-terrain motorized wheelchair that opened the Minnesota parks to more Minnesotans; and a roll of tape.

The nice invisible kind you reach for when your paper rips or you want the gift you’re wrapping to look crisp and neat. The beloved, familiar roll of tape almost every American has needed at some point in their lives.

There are many words that describe Scotch tape. Handy! Sticky! Cool? Cool might not be the first word you would use to describe your office supplies. Until now. The people have spoken. Lots and lots and lots of people.

That includes the good people of 3M, who offer this full-throated defense of the coolness of tape in general and Scotch tape in particular. Consider: There is a facility in Hutchinson, Minn., churning out 12 million miles of 3M tape ever year. Nearly enough tape to wrap from Hutchinson to Beijing and back, or to gift wrap one Vikings linebacker.

Minnesota gave the world its first roll of Scotch Masking Tape in 1925. In the worst days of the Great Depression, thrifty Americans used the tape to mend everything from ripped clothing to torn money to cracked eggs. Which sounds pretty magical even before the company’s 1961 invention of a magic tape that looks frosted on the roll but invisible once applied.

Chamber staff waded through a sea of submissions, weeding out products that may have originated in Minnesota but are no longer manufactured here. Because nothing is cooler than a product manufactured in Minnesota. Elizabeth Sherry, the chamber’s director of development and strategic partnerships, was one of the staffers with the tough job of weeding submissions down to an initial bracket of 64.

The inaugural “Coolest Thing Made In Minnesota Contest” drew more than 100,000 votes. Sherry watched smaller companies and communities throw their hearts into the effort. Marshall, Minn., mobilized around Action Trackchair, a rugged wheelchair Marshall resident Tim Swenson invented in 2009, to give wheelchair users like his son access to the state’s parks and wilderness. Today, Trackchairs are installed in parks across the state. Enthusiastic fans helped push the company into the final four.

“Marshall really got behind Action Trackchair,” Sherry said. Even in the final round up against Scotch tape, a household name about to celebrate its 100th anniversary, “it was close.”

But in the end, Minnesotans decided the adhesive tool was cooler than even Red Wing Shoes’ beloved Beckman Boot, which seemed like a shoo-in.

Maybe the coolest part of the Coolest Thing contest is how many choices Minnesotans had.

The winner receives a 20-pound trophy crafted in the shape of a light bulb with a Minnesota-shaped filament. A trophy made, of course, in Minnesota by Clow Stamping of Merrifield. If your favorite cool product didn’t win the trophy this year, the chamber plans to make this an annual competition.