Advertising, Car Design

VW in a New Light

By Delphine Hirasuna | June 25, 2019July 19, 2019

For baby boomers who came of age in the late 1960s, the VW Beetle is a symbol of carefree youthful abandon, beach parties, rock concerts, and living happily on a shoestring. It was a protest against the materialism of the older folks and their thirst for big cars with long tail fins. Aware that the humpbacked VW Bug could not compete on speed, comfort or sleek styling, ad agency Doyle Dane Bernbach had the chutzpah to turn the Beetle’s shortcoming into a symbol of hipness with bluntly honest slogans like “Think Small” and “Lemon.” It worked. By 1973, VW had sold more than 16 million Beetles worldwide.

Advertising

Audi Quattro: The One That Got Away

By Delphine Hirasuna | March 21, 2014February 19, 2019

This is a car commercial inspired by epic themes found in Herman Melville’s 1851 classic “Moby Dick.” Told by a tormented Alaska tow truck driver, played by David Florek, the modern-day Ahab is fraught with frustration, yearning and regret over the car that kept escaping his grasp, even in an arctic blizzard. Created by San Francisco ad agency Venables Bell & Partners, the commercial spins an overblown account of trying to hook the wily Audi Quattro. Though exaggerated to mythic proportions, the tale of the tow truck driver versus the Audi Quattro is not anything like the story of Ahab’s obsessive and vengeful pursuit of Moby Dick, the great white whale that chewed off his leg and ultimately destroyed his Pequod ship and him along with it. But the comparison makes a wonderful yarn, especially when you consider that the commercial is really about Audi Quattro’s four-wheel drive system — which would really be boring if the narrator told it straight.

Advertising

Johnnie Walker Tackles Driving Drunk Head-On

By Delphine Hirasuna | December 6, 2013September 4, 2014

When Johnnie Walker signed onto the Join the Pact initiative to promote responsible drinking, the whisky maker did more than lend its name to the campaign; it gave an impactful demonstration of what might happen when you drink and drive.

Marketing agency APAC Iris Singapore worked with Johnnie Walker to create this 90-second public service spot. The agency took advantage of the fact that Johnnie Walker has been a long-time sponsor of the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes Formula One racecar team, and proposed building a CGI model of a Formula One car out of 1,750 Johnnie Walker whisky glasses. The project, headed by Iris regional creative director Grant Hunter and film/3D director Russell Appleford, proved to be an arduous task. Just the crash scene alone required more than 100 gigabytes of data. Two-time world drivers’ champion Mika Häkkinen, Johnnie Walker’s responsible drinking ambassador, was brought in to give the voiceover message authority, advising, “Staying in control is what matters in racing. Split-second decisions are the difference between finishing first and finishing last – or not finishing at all.” For a liquor company, this approach is bold and civic minded. It addresses the potential danger of their product directly and doesn’t try to slip in a self-serving “buy more whisky and party hearty” plug.

Film

Remembering Saul’s Drive-Time Interviews

By Delphine Hirasuna | May 8, 2013September 4, 2014

Today would have been the legendary Saul Bass’s 93rd birthday and Google Doodle has paid tribute to him on its homepage by piecing together some of his signature film title sequences – “Vertigo,” “The Man with the Golden Arm,” “Psycho,” “Anatomy of a Murder,” “West Side Story,” among others.

This brought to mind my brief encounter with Saul. About two years before he died, I was assigned to interview him for an article on film title sequences. In his late 70s then, Saul had downsized his Sunset Boulevard studio maintaining what he called “a repertory group,” a small core staff with additional expertise brought in on an as needed basis. At the time, he was doing a title sequence for his friend “Marty’s”(Scorsese) film, and explained that at this stage in his career, he only wanted to work with “nice people who respect and like us and who we respect and admire…I don’t want to deal with clients who think we’re just doing a job for them. With rare exception, all our clients think we are wonderful and we think they are wonderful.” From a career standpoint, that seemed to me like the ultimate luxury.

Humor

Grey Poupon, The Sequel

By Delphine Hirasuna | March 1, 2013September 4, 2014

In the world of TV advertising, the “Pardon me, but do you have any Grey Poupon” commercial that first aired 32 years ago is a classic. Now it is back, but expanded and embellished for Internet and interactive viewing.

The latest Grey Poupon campaign started with a traditional television ad that aired on the Oscar Awards TV broadcast last Sunday. The 30-second spot, played like a trailer for the feature-length online version. Titled “The Chase,” the commercial, created by CP&B, picks up where the original left off in 1981, with two uber-rich gentlemen dining in elegance in their separate chauffeur-driven cars. As before, one gentleman leans out his window to ask the gentleman in the passing car if he had any Grey Poupon. Once he receives it, his car speeds off and that’s when the excitement begins…and leaves off. To see where the plot goes from there, viewers are told to visit the Grey Poupon website and click on the 2-minute “lost footage” version. From there, viewers are enticed to re-run the video and find the hidden “haute” spots to win prizes such as caviar and champagne flutes.