• by Karl Greenberg , May 13, 2008

General Motors' GMC division is launching a grassroots effort to promote its Acadia crossover through valet parking tickets and coffee cup sleeves. The campaign, which runs this month at shopping centers and cafes, centers on flattery, literally.

Complements like "Your hair looks really, really good today. Like, really good" and "Looks like someone woke up on the skinny side of the bed" are printed on valet parking tickets and coffee cup sleeves.

The effort extends last year's effort, in which the company paid for valet parking at shopping spots in L.A., Miami, Orlando, Phoenix, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco and Atlanta, and touted Acadia on valet tickets. It is doing the same thing month, plus offering free coffee at select cafes in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, St. Louis, Detroit, Philadelphia, Phoenix and Tampa.

In its hometown of Detroit, GMC will pick up the tab for all street-metered parking in suburb Birmingham, Mich., in late May. Custom meter covers will tell drivers that parking is free courtesy of GMC Acadia.

Besides Acadia messages on parking lot valet tickets, GMC will offer a double effect by having ads on the mechanical gate arms that allow access to and egress from parking lots. The gates will have full-color ad sleeves that slide sock-like over the gate arms, putting ads in front of drivers at the same time they get the flattering tickets.

GM says that it will distribute 10 million GMC Acadia-branded coffee sleeves in 6,000 coffee shops nationally, and more than three million full-color valet, hand-issued and machine-issued parking tickets.

AdverTickets and BriteVision Media brokered the parking and coffee sleeve ads, respectively. Both are units of out-of-home media company BriteMedia Group. GM Planworks and Starcom Worldwide handle General Motors' media tasks.

Mary Kubitskey, GMC National Ad manager said, in a release, the effort is meant to aim Arcadia at families. "We recognize how rushed our lives can be, from running errands with small children to grabbing a quick cup of joe on the way to work in the morning. We're hoping to make things a little easier by picking up the tab."