Here’s a challenge: from the message alone,
can you identify the automobile featured
in each of seven 1997 car advertisements?

The Print­ers Dev­il asks you to exam­ine sev­en mag­a­zine adver­tise­ments for com­pet­i­tive auto­mo­biles. These 1997 car ads all appeared  dur­ing Octo­ber 1997.  The head­lines and body copy, i.e. the writ­ten words in each adver­tise­ment, are print­ed below. There are no oth­er words in these adver­tise­ments. Each ad does bear the brand-name and a pho­to of the car.

Read the copy, guess the brand and/or mod­el and judge the adver­tise­ments by a) appeal to buy­ers, and by b) appro­pri­ate­ness of the cre­ative approach. The actu­al adver­tise­ments are repro­duced at the bot­tom of the post. Each is acces­si­ble imme­di­ate­ly from a link beneath the descrip­tive adver­tis­ing copy.

As you read the adver­tis­ing copy for each adver­tise­ment please keep in mind that these all came from cre­ative depart­ments of adver­tis­ing agen­cies. Artists and copy­writ­ers devel­oped each adver­tise­ment and an account exec­u­tive pre­sent­ed the con­cept to the client’s adver­tis­ing man­ag­er. Lots of pro­fes­sion­als approved these adver­tise­ments. Would you have approved these for your company’s adver­tis­ing? Do you agree that these adver­tise­ments “sell”?

The copy reads:     In the blink of an eye it’s gone. The 195HP V6 for pow­er­ful pass­ing. The high-per­for­mance sus­pen­sion for a superb ride. The trans­mis­sion that shifts imper­cep­ti­bly. The respon­sive , vari­able-effort steer­ing for pre­cise han­dling. All that remains is the burn­ing desire to dri­ve it.

Head­line: Instead of just read­ing about adven­ture imag­ine hav­ing one of your own.

The copy reads:     Imag­ine your­self in a ( auto­mo­bile). You could fill a few books on the shelf with your own expe­ri­ences. Here’s to set­ting off in search of them—in a ver­sa­tile (auto­mo­bile) like the go-any­where, pack-any­thing (mod­el). We designed it to sur­round you and your fam­i­ly in com­fort. And threw in a slid­ing rear seat to accom­mo­date vir­tu­al­ly any­thing or any­one you’ll be tak­ing on your next great adventure.

We under­stand that to grow up big and strong and sta­ble takes a real­ly, real­ly, real­ly long time. It takes more than days or weeks or months. It takes years and even decades. To grow and nur­ture and devel­op into some­thing that stands proud and mag­nif­i­cent. Pay trib­ute to the deter­mi­na­tion required to pro­duce such hearty roots. And let us all live by its sim­ple creed: grow, blos­som and flourish.

Dear Mrs. Respon­si­ble; You nev­er missed a school play. You remem­ber everyone’s birth­day, includ­ing your father-in-law’s. You nev­er went on a golf week­end. With all due respect, Ma’am, you’re due.  This is (mod­el) by (automak­er), You can get a super­charged engine. It’s big­ger than some mini­vans but it only seats four. So it’s not the per­fect fam­i­ly car. That’s the point.

There is no body copy.

There’s a line of type at the bot­tom of the page that reads: It’s hard to imag­ine a bet­ter way to have fun in nature than with a (auto­mo­bile)

The more you pay, the more you get.

Is this: A) False   B) Untrue    C) Crazy.

We don’t want to con­fuse any­one out there. Some peo­ple do get what they pay for. Oth­ers get much more. Maybe they know some­thing the rest of us don’t. Or maybe they sim­ple dri­ve (auto­mo­bile) It’s loaded with gad­gets you usu­al­ly get in more expen­sive cars. Gad­gets that help make it easy to own. Like a theft-deter­rent sys­tem and bat­tery-run­down pro­tec­tion. But—get this—at $12,808 you don’t pay a lot. You get a lot. Honest.

“my, my, how things have changed.”

The right-hand page has a good sized pho­to of the auto­mo­bile and the copy reads:

If you live ling enough, you’re liable to see just about any­thing. Pic­tures from Mars. Pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates blowin’ the sax. The Macare­na. Next thing you know, some­body will be telling you with a straight face, that the (mod­el) has even changed too. Well guess what, it has. It’s secure, qui­et and more pow­er­ful than ever before. The all-new 1998 (auto­mo­bile). Proof that small steps can indeed lead to one giant leap.

Mystery 1997 car ad #1

Mystery 1997 car ad #2

Mystery 1997 car ad #3

Mystery 1997 car ad #4

Mystery 1997 car ad #5

Mystery 1997 car ad #6

Mystery 1997 car ad #7