“A dozen or so contributors, mostly college students from Orange County, have spent the past year building an exact replica of the “Toy Story” Pizza Planet truck — down to the glowing rocket on top, one-of-a-kind bumper stickers and license plate (miraculously, nobody in the studio or beyond had claimed “RES1536″ from the California DMV),” according to SFGate.com. “Pixar employees have a soft spot for their animated version of the truck, and have found a way to place it in every one of the studio’s feature films. After learning about the ‘real’ truck, “Toy Story 3″ director Lee Unkrich gave the team props on Twitter, and others in the studio acknowledged their existence from afar. But the team of bright-eyed Pixar fans were still floored when the studio’s public relations team sent them an e-mail, and invited them to drive the truck through the studio’s employees-only gates.”

Follow the team’s blog The Road to Pixar here.