As designers (or aspiring ones) I’m sure most of you will agree that Super Bowl night is the Big Night of Who’s Who in innovative advertising strategies. I just want to say that I wish I had $109k and enough importance to convince someone I deserve one of the appearantly already-sold-out R8′s. As a car-lover I had already read about this car, then I saw one in person at the Washington Auto Show last weekend, and tonight I could not wait to see Audi’s ground-breaking commercial for the R8. Not only because I get as excited over this car as other girls might get over seeing Tom Brady in person, but because a very close friend of mine helped design the commercial, which (though I may be biased) I feel was by far the best commercial of the night, especially as far as the car commercials go.
I was reading an article that my friend sent me about the commercial (http://www.usatoday.com/money/advertising/2008-01-17-audi-super-bowl_N.htm”) where a creative director says that the designers realized that most people don’t pay attention to car commercials unless they are in the market for a new vehicle. Far too often car commercials all use the same concepts to convey the same, tired ideas. I recall watching football games all season and commenting on how at every commercial break there were at least 2 or 3 truck commercials “proving” that they could descend a rollercoaster type hill and stop on a dime, or pull a jet behind them, and so on and so on. All of the commercials looked the same to me after awhile, whether it was Ford, Nissan, or Toyota. I couldn’t tell you at this point which commercial was which, and if I were in the market for a truck I would still probably choose one based on looks, because none of them stood out to me in terms of durability and/or strength. On that note, I must say that the Audi commercial does exactly what the designers intended it to do. I do admit, the car could probably stand out on its own, so long as they just showed the end footage where the car starts up and speeds away, because the sound of the engine alone makes my own ears perk up and heart race. But for the average (rich) Joe who isn’t a car geek like myself, it helps very much to have something as attention-grabbing as the suspenseful build-up of the beginning of the commercial.
Watch the commercial: http://www.audiusa.com/audi/us/en2.html