Comments on: Scion Ad Suffers Scary-Ass Irony Failure: “United by Individuality”

By: dauer962

dauer962 — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 05:43:18 +0000

you can’t even call it oxymoronic—obviously it’s a play on words or supposed to sound paradoxical but somehow profound. (i think the irony part comes in where by being so “invididualistic” these people are all the same on a different level…i would just call them self-obsessed punks…i think the other irony part is that this culture must be so self-aware by now…cmon this stuff is so 2fast2furious already several times over)

what actually bothered/angered/amused/intrigued me most is making the dork at the microphone some “urban dude” amalgam.

what race is he (nondescript/hard to tell…)? he’s probably not a college kid whose parents bought him the car. he probably has a part-time job. maybe community college. he enunciates some words normally and then gets all “urban” for some others. so yeah. i think it’s the demographic targeting and implications it makes that bothers me.

By: ferrarimanf355

ferrarimanf355 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:30:40 +0000

dolo54,

Or you could play the video game. Yes, there’s a video game- and a pretty damn good one, too- for the PS2, Xbox and PSP.

By: dolo54

dolo54 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:28:24 +0000

@ carguy: thanks for reminding me to put that on my netflix. haven’t seen that in years.

By: Diary of a Mad Natural Historian » Go Steam Venture!

Diary of a Mad Natural Historian » Go Steam Venture! — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:27:49 +0000

[...] what you will about the Scion line (I understand many are put off by the officialitude of the Scion factory mod parts) the fact remains that what they are trying to [...]

By: dolo54

dolo54 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:24:43 +0000

Here’s the fantastic speech from The Warriors that they were trying to copy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYd2deSmrnE

This was in the theaters for Batman, everybody was snickering when it came on. Some groaning as well.

By: z31

z31 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:14:57 +0000

folkdancer :
When you get old you ~~start to pay attention to the details like seats and noise.~~ give up on life and buy a camry

sorry, couldn’t help it :p

By: f8

f8 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 06:26:57 +0000

Right, sorry. Let me update that to “Corolla for Old People (Camry)”. Hope this helps

By: folkdancer

folkdancer — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 06:13:44 +0000

This is a rough breakdown of Toyota’s car lineup:

Corolla
Corolla Large (Camry)

ha,ha, very funny (sarcasm)

There is a big difference between the Corolla and Camry. The Corolla has cheap seats that hurt my back after even a short ride. The Camry has very nice seats that support my lower back and I can drive all day without pain.

When you get old you start to pay attention to the details like seats and noise.

By: the duke

the duke — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 06:05:11 +0000

“Scion *did* lower the average age of Toyota buyers in the US for the first couple of years…by attracting low 30-somethings…To me, Scion previously was a marketing failure with a good product.”*

Which brings us to this truth: good product doesn’t need marketed. Yes, you must get the message of its existence out, but after that, let it be. How many ads do you see for Accords, compared to Malibu’s? The new Malibu, isn’t as bad as it was, but the old one was so bad that Marketing is in hyper-drive.

I think Robert made the point in the first “Sciontology” piece: the xB was a good product, and would have sold itself no matter what badge they put on it – Toyota could have brought back the Toyopet name (well, maybe not). The Fit is a great example for this – Honda can’t ship enough of ‘em to the states, and its badged a Honda, not a Hooka.

*For the life of me, I can’t figure out how to make the quote tags work

By: f8

f8 — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 05:18:55 +0000

came in to point out that Sion ripped off Honda’s “Civic Nation”, discovered that someone else remembers those ads too

This is a rough breakdown of Toyota’s car lineup:

Corolla
Corolla Large (Camry)
Corolla Small (Yaris sedan)
Corolla XS (Yaris coupe)
Corolla XL (Avalon)
Corolla Convertible (Solara)
Corolla Wagon (Matrix)

And this is Scion:

Corolla Ugly (xD)
Corolla Boxy (xB)
Corolla Coupe (tC)

By: westhighgoalie

westhighgoalie — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 19:46:52 +0000

this is a good commercial, if only Scion was a good car, like subaru. Subaru’s are indestructible I have 310,000 miles on mine and the only regular maintenance is oil changes.

Plus Scion doesn’t offer a (wrx type car, fast and affordable) car that would bring in business from their target market.

By: JuniorMint

JuniorMint — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 18:14:28 +0000

As a side note, I don’t know how they can continue to use the first-gen xB as their Big Square Brand Symbol after axing replacing it with the bloated piece of crap they’re selling now.

By: jconli1

jconli1 — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 17:54:27 +0000

@F355…

“have you seen their P&A catalog?”.

My point exactly – getting people to believe they’re joining a culture (yet asserting individuality) simply by buying things out of a brand catalog.

I’m not necessarily defending Scion or slamming H-D here, but I think proclaiming individuality while defining yourself by a brand is just damn sad all the way around… but its as American as Calvin pissing on things, and certainly not relegated to the younger generations.

By: John Horner

John Horner — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 16:15:45 +0000

“I want to be unique and different, just like my friends” seems to pass as deep thinking with a certain fraction of the young set.

By: Michael Ayoub

Michael Ayoub — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:55:54 +0000

I’m 17. I’m in high school. I should love Scions! But… I don’t. I despise them. I saw that Scion commercial at the movie theater a couple days ago, and a few people in the crowd yelled, “YEAH!!” after the hooded man started talking. Stupid Sciontologists. You’re not different.

By: Durishin

Durishin — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:30:23 +0000

Makes me think of the recent 3-Series commercial:

“…we didn’t set out to start a religion…”

Scion should hope to do 1/4 as well.

By: storminvormin

storminvormin — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 08:11:59 +0000

We’re all individuals? Dats tyte yo!!

It’s designed to appeal to the guys who bought automatic 4-door Civics and promptly put rims and kitty-cannons on them to be individuals.

By: ferrarimanf355

ferrarimanf355 — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 05:33:26 +0000

jconli1, Harley Davidson has been around for over a century, so they know what works. Besides, have you seen their parts and accessories catalog? That thing is thicker than a phone book…

By: jconli1

jconli1 — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 05:26:32 +0000

oddly, that exact approach has done wonders for Harley Davidson.

By: cmus

cmus — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 04:24:03 +0000

I still enjoy my 2004 xB. I am pretty well outside the original scion target market. (I was over 30 when I bought it)

Scion *did* lower the average age of Toyota buyers in the US for the first couple of years…by attracting low 30-somethings.

The 2nd generation xB appears to me to be a giant (heh heh) design failure stemming from a complete lack of understanding of why the gen 1 was selling. It should probably be used in future strategic management textbooks as a case study in how to screw up a good thing. Maybe they can put it right next to the Honda-dropping-the-CRX case study.

To me, Scion previously was a marketing failure with a good product. Now, they’re *just* a marketing failure, as this commercial does an excellent job of displaying.

By: Bruce Banner

Bruce Banner — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 04:13:02 +0000

@quasimondo – exactly. But the Toyota/Scion version leaves me feeling embarrassed to have watched it. I’m going to wash my eyeballs now.

By: JuniorMint

JuniorMint — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 03:54:54 +0000

The REAL irony here is that most Scion owners hate one another.

xA owners are bitter because their car was never the cool one…
…original xB owners are pissed because our car WAS the cool one, and got axed anyway…
…gen 2 xB owners get hacked off because gen 1 owners make fun of them…
…xD drivers are bitter because they realized two weeks after signing the paperwork they should have bought a fit…
…and tC drivers are all 16 and hate EVERYONE.

We must be the only car company on the planet where all the model owners despise one another. =6

By: BlueEr03

BlueEr03 — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 03:28:14 +0000

but then this is targetted more towards the Facebook generation I suppose. I’m not supposed to get it.

I am a member of the Facebook generation and I don’t get it either. Of course, I don’t get the appeal of Scion/Toyota’s to the person who wants to be an individual. You can’t be an individual and own a corolla/xB, as there are thousands of other people exactly like you, and thinking the same way as you.

By: quasimondo

quasimondo — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 03:18:30 +0000

This is such a ripoff of the ‘Civic Nation’ commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUxuMHHJxCs

By: ferrarimanf355

ferrarimanf355 — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 02:19:43 +0000

I saw this commercial in the theaters before Pineapple Express. Commence the “you must be stoned to even consider a Scion” jokes.