The Emperor’s New Ad
Once upon a time in the kingdom of luxury automobiles, the esteemed Jaguar board gathered to discuss a bold new vision for their brand. They had decided to embark on an avant-garde advertising campaign that would showcase their commitment to innovation and modernity. Two crafty Brand Managers approached them with grand ideas, claiming they could create an advertisement so daring that only the most discerning and sophisticated individuals would understand its brilliance. They would delete the ordinary!
The Brand Managers set to work, crafting a 30-second spectacle. Jaguar’s heritage of elegance, luxury, reliability, and performance was to mean nothing in the quest to delete the ordinary. Models of all races strode through abstract scenes, slogans echoing through the air: “Create Exuberant”, “Live Vivid”, “Delete Ordinary” and “Copy Nothing”. And the pièce de résistance of the ad that copied nothing? This car advertisement was utterly denuded of cars.
As the advertisement premiered, the Jaguar board beamed with pride, convinced they had ushered in a new era for their brand. However, as the ad spread across the kingdom, whispers of confusion and ridicule began to arise. In the bustling marketplace of social media, one voice rang out amidst the crowd. “Do you sell cars?” Elon asked innocently, his question piercing through the pretentiousness of the moment.
The crowd erupted in laughter, echoing his sentiment. “Where are the cars?” another voice chimed in. “This is surely a joke”, and “This is another Bud Light moment”. The mocking voices multiplied, each one reflecting the bewilderment felt by many who had long admired Jaguar for its sleek designs and powerful vehicles.
Despite the growing ridicule, some in the kingdom — especially those who wanted to appear fashionable and progressive — continued to praise the ad’s artistic flair. They spoke of its boldness and creativity, unwilling to admit that perhaps they were being swept away by a wave of groupthink. After all, who would dare to speak against such avant-garde artistry?
In time, the Jaguar board was forced to confront this reality. They realised that while it is admirable to break moulds, create exuberant and live vivid, they must never lose sight of what truly matters: connecting with their audience and showcasing their remarkable vehicles.
The moral of the story: go woke, go broke.
This article was first published on Laura’s Substack, the Free Mind. Subscribe here.
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Contrast that pile of progressive rainbow poop with this beauty. And this is how it should be, car front and centre, with major bonus points for the farmer and gorgeous countryside;
”At least Porsche GB
know how to make a car advert. Introducing the Aimé Leon Dore Porsche 993 Turbo.
Breath taking car, breath taking scenery.”
https://x.com/DaveAtherton20/status/1859506240017121504
Cripes, this is sacrilege. Austin Powers eat your heart out!
”E-Type Jaguars just dropped from £150k to £10k.
Who’s gonna drive one now..?”
https://x.com/AvonandsomerRob/status/1859253799191294357
It’s not even that original. If they’d hired me (someone who has zero creativity whatsoever) and told me to make a “modern, progressive” advert the result would probably be pretty similar. It’s almost a parody of wokeness, full of clichés and bingo sheet ticks.
Seriously, they should’ve just hired Mr Tumble and had done. 😮
Why did they think that an advertisement directed against their customers (i.e. people who like nice cars) would work? How it is that Western business is infected and afflicted with these dolts?
I wonder what John Prescott would have made of the advert.
I think he was so disgusted with it that he dropped dead.
I had the same thought but couldn’t think of a suitably pithy comment
Advertising is supposed to achieve two things: confirm to existing consumers they made the right choice – brand reinforcement; to encourage potential consumers buying your product is the right choice.
The problems with the Jaguar ad is it has nothing to do with the brand, and doesn’t say what they are selling.
When I saw these ads, I assumed they were advertising a fashion show somewhere and so just ignored them.
Always funny that every org wants to save the planet / change the world / solve global ‘problems’. Perhaps focus instead on a) designing and making nice cars and b) sell them to people to make money, so you can continue doing [a]… annnnnd repeat
it almost seems too obvious to them?
They have gained an awful lot of publicity for the price of a very short, presumably rather cheap ad.
None of it appears to be good though…
They do say that don’t they, but the example of bud lite shows that a huge viewing of an utterly shit insulting (to your core customers) ad can be devastating.
And so, I think it will prove with this one.
It’s definitely got a Budlite feeling to it hasn’t it…
I don’t think it’s the same as the Bud Lite situation – though the ad has had a lot of negative attention, are people saying negative things about the car?
Presumably advertisers feel they can make people choose their car over others with a good advert, but does it work the other way around? After all, most of us buy cars rarely and presumably take a range of factors into consideration.
Finally, this is an advert, not some weird endorsement tie-in with a mentally ill person.
Apart from an ad which has the feel of a student art project, it’s the mangling of the English language I hate. I come across it everywhere. My current bugbear is recipes with costings, usually found in supermarket magazines, described as (say) £1 per SERVE. No! The word is ‘serving’. On similar lines, poncy menus that leave out the pound sign – perhaps trying to make the food appear cheaper? I don’t know. Confused my husband no end.
“What are all these numbers down the side?”
“The price.”
“Dear God!”
I know language changes, but surely grammar doesn’t?
Unfortunately the grammar does change! Eg. It’s now quite acceptable to say “I was sat/stood” and it’s even made the Oxford Dictionary. And don’t get me going on “I should of …….”! Our fabulous language has been sacrificed to regional colloquialisms at the expense of clarity.
It’s a feature of capitalism that firms who are too enthusiastic and buy too much stock, or build too much track, or upgrade to too expensive offices, or build too many factories will fail.
It’s even more of an irony that enthusiastic firms can suffer or fail by being too concerned with social matters not directly bearing on their core business. Jaguar might hope that people are going to be so impressed by the wokedness of the advert that it will build a demand for their cars. But prance about in transparent lycra, buy an EV, save the world is not a winning proposition in my view.
The feature of Socialism is that firms that ignore the customer continue to produce inferior merchandise, and expect to be bailed out, continually, by the tax payers, until they run out of other people’s money.
Do you sell cars?
No, we sell EVs.
Can be summed up as “too many graduates, too few engineers”
There is no way back just like there is no way back for the luxury car market or the luxury anything market. In economics they call it the hourglass effect. The top and the bottom swell up and the middle is squeezed out of existence. This effect can only intensify A few at the top but not enough to keep manufacturers alive. And without western markets the elites in other countries will suffer in the short term. I mean it has reached crazy proportions now how downtrodden do you want to be? Even towns and cities that were pleasant a few years ago are horrible now. This situation isn’t going to rectify itself.
Yep, I noticed towns and cities going downhill. Even the relatively affluent ones.
There is a general grubbiness and a sense of decay around.
How to ensure that flagging sales flag even further. Do they even know who their target market is?
Why would any company work this hard to destroy its name brand? It just did.
To move Design and Manufacturing to their own country?
My own take on the Jaguar ad – https://tomed.substack.com/p/jaguar-cars-are-now-a-clothes-brand
at the heart of it, destruction is the name of the game.
Bud Light and the Dylan Mulvaney fiasco was supposed to be a warning not something to aspire to. Competent companies should be avoiding ‘doing a Ratner’.
If you haven’t already, I urge you all to read Parkinson’s Law by C Northcote Parkinson
Except that they didn’t realise. In fact they doubled down. They condemned the backlash to the ad as “vile hatred and intolerance”.
https://news.sky.com/story/jaguar-boss-condemns-vile-hatred-after-backlash-to-new-advert-13259065
The ironic thing about the ad is that while Jaguar seem to think it is new and trendy, in reality it seems stale, old fashioned and boring.
Which is a shame because they make amazing, beautiful and wonderful cars