automotive

Toyota Prius V Ad Effort Is For Real

Pirus-B

These days, “computer graphics” tends to be synonymous with creativity -- whether in tentpole movies, games, TV shows, or apps, for that matter. In just about any medium involving a screen, if Hal 9000 didn't have a digital hand in it, it's not worth watching. 

Toyota has actually eschewed that inexorable trend, at least for its Prius lineup of vehicles. Advertising for the vehicles, via Saatchi & Saatchi L.A., has been almost religious about using actual people, things, sets, props, old-school art and choreography, and real handmade human creativity in its advertising.

This … well, you might call it "artisanal advertising" sort of makes sense if you think about the hybrid gas/electric sub-brand’s brand proposition and eco-conscious raison d’être. Some examples: roadside "Harmony Floralscapes" in Los Angeles that are real flowerbeds; the "Harmony" TV ad that used a lot of choreography and even more dancers dressed up to look like fields of flowers and plants; the “Prius Goes Plural” ads that featured giant "people" made of real Pilobolus-style contortionists; and a portfolio ad showing the Prius lineup in a miniature town.

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The company is doing it again in with a campaign for the latest version of Prius, a crossover variant called Prius V. This time the agency hired the DP for Terry Gilliam's fantastical projects (think "Brazil," "Time Bandits," and "Baron Munchausen"), some old-school set painters from Hollywood's golden era and the Augustus Punch ad collective, probably best known for that extravagant Macy's ad (featuring Donald Trump, Sean Combs, Martha Stewart, et alia) to direct.  

The effort, which includes TV, print, out of home and an iPad execution, all with a hyper-chromatic feel, looks at the daily lives of the peripatetic Gen Xers against whom this new vehicle is positioned.

The campaign spotlights the vehicle's multifarious features -- intended to be attractive for those who are always active, on the move, and who need a vehicle that doesn't disconnect them from their cloud-based virtual society.

The ads -- well, it's hard to describe the ads, really -- you sort of have to see them. But the camera takes you into the rear cargo bay, and from there into a grocery bag that becomes a Beatrix Potter-like Arcadian world of farms and gardens where a woman is buying vegetables. Then it shifts to a family cavorting near a hot air balloon, thence to a giant audio speaker behind which musicians are taking band instruments from the back of the vehicle. Each set is an actual large-scale physical installation, according to Margaret Keene, co-executive creative director at the agency.

Keene tells Marketing Daily that the hyper-reality of the ads is driven by a desire to create a fantastical, essentially optimistic mood. "The previous shoots have all been vibrant and colorful; at its core is color and optimism," she says. 

Kirk Williams, associate CD at Saatchi L.A., says: "We wanted this to be something people would want to see again and again,” adding that the ads have hidden visual "Easter eggs" to keep people wanting to watch again to see what they missed. "And we had three or four old guys who painted Hollywood scenes in the old-fashioned method creating dimensional reality; we limited CG (computer generation) as much as possible to give it an authentic feel that comes through in everything. People may not know, logically, what is CG and what isn't, but you still get a visceral feeling about what is real and what is digital," he says.

Keene says in-house research at Saatchi on who the intenders are for each of the Prius portfolio of vehicles made it fairly clear that since Prius V consumers are likely to understand the particulars of telematic technology, the campaign could take creative liberties instead of focusing on explaining features.

"Technology is a given for them," she says. "They appreciate technology a lot and expect Prius to have the best. That means we have an opportunity to tell more of a story. Prius' intended consumer understands apps -- they get that it's something that will be part of [Toyota's] Entune [telematics system], that will bring them streaming music and content. They get the references."

Next up will be ads for the Prius C, and the Prius plug-in hybrid, toward the end of the year, and there will be new programs under the crowd-sourced Prius Projects banner.

 

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