The “Swagger Wagon” — The Perfect Toyota To Go Shark Jumping In
For a time, I thought Toyota would emerge relatively unscathed from its recent recall, despite the best efforts of the DC-based board of Government Motors to screw their competition. If only because, unlike GM, Toyota has earned a fair amount of good will from its loyal customer base. But that was before I saw this:
The horror. The horror.
Where to begin? I was alerted to this ad campaign via a comment yesterday from James Lileks on Twitter:
I’m taking up a collection to hire a hit man to deal with the Douche Family in that Toyota “Swagger Wagon” Sienna ad. Anyone in?
Let me think about it.
OK, where do I sign?
You’ll note that the first clip was recorded by someone holding a camcorder in front of his TiVo-equipped TV. [Update: Replaced by better quality clip -- Ed. Late Update: See below.] The second, much higher-res clip is part of a whole series of viral videos that Toyota commissioned featuring this staggeringly self-absorbed couple, featuring the castrated comic relief “male” now ubiquitous in television advertising. But the official version of the “swagger wagon” ad is now apparently behind a permission-required firewall on YouTube, perhaps because of the intense negative reaction to having a Toyota minivan called — shudder – the “Swagger Wagon.”
Toyota’s ad campaign makes Audi’s Green Police ad look as though it was created by Don Draper on one of his best days at the office. In contrast, taken as a whole, the Toyota campaign very much reminded me of Microsoft’s viral efforts last fall to sell Windows 7, featuring another group of people so happy, shiny and Up With People pathetic that they had to be a parody that the ad team hoped would go viral simply out of the sheer camp involved. And they’re in sharp contrast to Toyota’s hip, confident advertising efforts down under.
One blogger described the Toyota Sienna ads as a maximum overload of meta:
And there is a lot of thinking. You’re not boring, you’re cool. But you know you’re not really cool. You laugh at yourself. But also at everybody else.
META-Meta-meta.
Toyota has covered every psychological angle. On the YouTube campaign page, they even call the couple “self-absorbed,” in case anybody is annoyed by cloyingly likable people.
We’re living in a post Arrested Development world people. (Which if you want to get meta, is a post-Office world). Which if you want to get meta-meta, is a Toyota Sienna world…
Include me out, please. (Though I realize that by trashing these ads, I’m helping to push them out, just adding to the whole meta overload. But then, I reject Toyota’s “reality”, and substitute my — hopefully more earthbound — own.)
Twenty years ago, if one associated the words “swagger” and “wagon” with Toyota, this is what would have come to mind:
These days, there’s this:
And in the process of trying sell it, Toyota has found a novel way to also eliminate the problems they’re having with “unintended acceleration:” they’ve gotten the shoe off the gas pedal by shooting themselves square in the foot.
Late Update: Both videos in the above clip were eventually pulled from YouTube. I’m not sure if that’s due to Toyota’s influence or not, but I think the second clip is the same one that was originally here, but uploaded by a different YouTube user. (It certainly makes the point about the lameness of the TV dad in the commercial, in any case. The first clip I had downloaded to my archives, and I’m uploading it to this post to replace the now missing original clip.
Crap. And my wife is looking at replacing her Nissan Maxima (Slot. Car.) with the Sienna.
Well, at least it remain hidden in the garage.
I just fired off a nastygram to Toyota beginning with the phrase, “Jesus H Christ on a Pogo Stick!”
This is “New Coke” all over again.
Regards
Assuming the ad campaign was draw up before the recall woes, it’s understandable who Toyota is pushing this campaign towards, since going back to the early 70s, there’s always been a certain sense of ‘elitism’ behind buying a foreign car by the bi-coastal liberals, UAW solidarity be damned. The integration of foreign automakers into the industrial base of the U.S. economy has soften the difference over the past 30 years, but if you look at the states and the percentage of vehicles sold by foreign automakers, the foreign market always has been higher in Blue States than in Red ones.
3.John. Next time, why don’t you use the name of Allah? Leave the Christ out of it.
Just another ad aimed at the growing number of p***y whipped beta males. Wife wants/needs a new minivan to haul the kids around and the beta male must be humored therefore Toyota has just what the doctor ordered. In the old days the man just suffered through it until the kids were gone and he could get a real car. He knew there was no swagger in the waggon.
Sure, it makes me roll my eyes, but it’s got you all talking about the Sienna…
How can eco posers impress the planet when their Toyota Pius is in the shop?
Maybe they have a bumper sticker “my other car is a Toyota Hybrid Pious”
The reason car companies gave for marketing SUV’s to people who would find a minivan more useful at a lower price was the image. They said, “A minivan fairly screams ‘Mommymobile’. An SUV makes the owner look rugged and outdoorsy.” SUV owners rarely drive off-road (not on purpose, anyway) but they loved the commercials showing their four-wheel mastodons driving triumphantly across terrain which would stop a main battle tank. “Lookamee! I drive a butt-ugly Hummer!” The rugged, outdoorsy marketing of the SUV’s was successfully exploited by Mini Cooper, who marketed a car as different as possible from an SUV. Calling your minivan a “swagger wagon”, when a minivan (I have owned one for twelve years) offers no particular reason to swagger is more of the same counter-marketing. It offers smugness equal to the SUV ads, merely in the opposite direction.
Actually, a large enough mini-van is just an enclosed pickup truck. We have a 1999 Dodge Grand Caravan with the commercial suspension (this option is for hotels that buy these and repaint them as hotel courtesy vans) and the 3.8L V6. Take out the back two rows of seats and you have — a pickup truck with the bed enclosed. Haul lumber, stone, tools, etc. The cargo doesn’t get rained on, snowed on, and no “sticky fingers” lift anything.
Put the back two rows of seats back in — and it hauls a full load of moms plus rugrats.
I am in the market for a minivan. I saw the swagger wagon ad last night and I actually liked it, a lot. I also like the Volkswagen Routan ads. I haven’t made my final decision but I like both… I like that the sienna is all new for 2011.. and also that it is a “swagger wagon”. Loved the ad, toyota!
Well, Vince, then “swagger” or swish your way down to your local dealer. See if they have purses to match the color of your wagon in the accessory department.
I guess the ad is supposed to be “tongue-in-cheek” regarding “daddy” and his new-found “swagga”. He finally found a female he could boss around, at least until she’s 7 or 8 and realizes what a wuss she has for a father. Of course, there’s some poor sap out there of 7 or 8 who’ll marry her in 15 years, perpetuating the browbeaten, p-whipped male species. Here’s a news flash “Swagger Daddy” . . . your back problems are probably the result of chronic “bending over”.
I respectfully think you should get over yourselves, the commercial is funny.
are you serious? this is funny! as in “funny or die” kind of humor. as in people making fun of themselves and their wanna-be-hipness in suburbia. i think the whole meta-meta-meta comment is maybe, um, a bit of overthinking? and really people? pu**y whipped? am i sensing some male insecurity here? get a sense of humor.
there is no swagger in a minivan, but when you need it you need it. so one can pretend.
I was also horrified by this ad. The vehicle is a hippo. I had an 91 Camry Wagon; now THAT baby could have been a “swagger wagon” ! I’ve seen a few fixed up to that level. I thought of it as a great ‘stealth’ mobile. Had a Mustang put himself in the weeds one night trying to pass me. The suspension on that thing was marvelous, and the engine was surprisingly strong for being so small ( for a V6 ). Hated losing that beauty, but it wasn’t quite able to hold up to being nailed in the rear by an F350…. I drove it away, but the insurance company declared it totalled.
i like the ad. i think its funny.because being a mom and staying home all the time with the kids you feel like you loss your so called swagger. so to say i drive a swagger wagon makes me laugh and who ever i tell it to….
It’s a joke people. They are playing on the irony of it all. Obviously they are trying to appeal to people who know it’s not “cool” to drive a mini-van and yet don’t give a rat’s a$$. I just traded in my “cool” SUV piece of shhhh…evy for a 2011 Sienna. The quality throughout the entire vehicle is beyond compare and It’s nice to be able to make sharp turns. I needed half a football field to do a U-turn in my SUV. With three kids it has so much more comfort, space, storage and convenience features. I’m in love with my Swagger Wagon!