26 Votes

Audi's new marketing insult the Competition will this work??

bmwdrvr submitted on 2/1/2009 Official Bell & Ross Timestamp: 6:44:05 PM

37 user comments | Category: Misc News | Source: | SOURCE: www.truthinengineering.com

Tag Links: audi, bmw, lexus, mercedes, luxury, innovation, marketing

Earlier today a freind of mine sent me this link and thought I would find it hilarious.

Of course I do Audi's new attempt at establishing ground in America is by insulting the competition. Will insulting these brands really steal prospectice customers, or current customers. Or will it backfire. I find it interesting that while alot of the information isnt accurate, they do take stabs at each of what is considered our top 3 luxury brands Mercedes, BMW, and Lexus. They call BMW's pretentious, Lexus toyotas claiming to be a luxury car, and Mercedes as the luxury badge in the 70's but only the pacer was competition while going through and saying the competition has rested on its laurels and showing all the "new" innovations Audi has done while these 3 brands simply do nothing lol pretty comical and misleading to those that dont know cars. What do you think?

Read Article

Audi's new marketing insult the Competition will this work??

About the Author

— bmwdrvr (View Profile)

User Comments

At least they are right about Lexus
— uall (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 8:17:26 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 0

Sorry, but all I can think about is that fact that I was smart enough NOT to ever get rid of my wonderful 1991 BMW Sport Evolution... It still runs/looks great, and remains one of the finest handling sedans I've ever owned - Bar None!
— DaHarder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 8:28:54 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 6

Wow, and article by bmwdrv. The last person that should commenting on anything about Audi. The most bias anti-Audi next to the defunct amazing idiot on this blog. Of course the ad works. It is about having fun and making fun of the concepts of what people assume is prestige and badge whores like bmwdrv and others on this site. Kudos Audi for pissing of those anti-Audi types. The best was the pretensious BMW and the pink Lexus. Speaks volumes about their ownership.
— VISO (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 9:51:55 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -8

your so ignorrant badge whore.....I actually said the Audi TTS was one of the best cars under 50 grand, if Audi thinks by insulting the people they want to buy their cars with tastless tacky, attacks it wont work, and neither will your "nothing at all to do with cars, on a car blog personal insult." lol you want to impress me bring facts, leave "crazy" bias at home.
— bmwdrvr (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 12:01:05 AM | | Votes: 3

It's the lamest possible move, especially from a company that on one side makes really good cars, on the other is busy selling tarted up Volkswagens. At least the Lexus ES is the Toyota Camry with lots of options. You take a Camry, add a lot to it in terms of options and the engine and from some point in is badged as the Lexus ES. Meanwhile the Krauts from Audi take a VW Golf or Rabbit (by the way isn't this the gayest possible name for a car?), do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to it, particularly add no additional stuff at all and don't make it in any way better, rip off the VW sticker, glue four rings onto it and... raise the price by exactly 30%. For the very same car with the very same engine and the very same equipment. There are 200 thousands idiots annually in Europe with surgically excised brains who get tricked like this, ensured they've bought a "premium" Audi. And you though Europeans were smart. So remember: yes, you can sell your customers the same for 30% more if only you brainwash them enough and persuade their neighbors will be "impressed".
— downtoearth (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 10:09:44 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -1

Word! The A3 and A4 in europe is no more luxurious than a VW Golf. Heck it even has the same engines. Yet they have the balls to pick on a Lexus ES?
— DinamoR (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 11:18:04 PM | | Votes: 0

The "Krauts" invented the automobile (Karl Benz in 1886 - http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/269/1885benzmx2.jpg ), the four-cycle engine (Nicolaus August Otto in 1876), the diesel engine (Rudolph Diesel in in 1897) and the rotary engine (Felix Wankel in 1957). What were the Japanese doing around the same time? In the 1870's they were spending a third of their annual budget employing Europeans and Americans to teach them science, math and engineering ---- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O-yatoi_gaikokujin .
— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 10:19:58 AM | | Votes: 3

TurboSpyder:Before Japanese were employing Europeans, Germans were employing British engineers to teach them British technologies necessary for Industrial Revolution, baseing on these technologies Germans could later develop their own technologies like e.g.four cycle engine, diesel engine... :[Quote]:"The Industrial Revolution on Continental Europe came a little later than in Great Britain. In many industries, this involved the application of technology developed in Britain in new places. Often the technology was purchased from Britain or British engineers and entrepreneurs moved abroad in search of new opportunities. By 1809 part of the Ruhr Valley in Westphalia was called 'Miniature England' because of its similarities to the industrial areas of England. The German, Russian and Belgian governments all provided state funding to the new industries. In some cases (such as iron), the different availability of resources locally meant that only some aspects of the British technology were adopted." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_revolution#Continental_Europe]
— abcd (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 7:24:31 PM | | Votes: -1

abcd, before it was possible for the industrial revolution to occur in Britain the scientific revolution had to occur to provide the fundamental math and science tools. German mathematicians and scientists (along with other Western Europeans scientists) figured prominently in developing these tools going all the way back to Gottfried Leibniz who independently invented *modern* calculus and whose notation is still in use today. As for Russia, they are basically still a resource based economy and have been hit very hard by the slide in the price of oil. A few months ago I watched a program where a German company was building a baby food factory in Russia and because the infrastructure there is so piss poor they had to dig their own wells for water as well as providing their own electricity.
— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/3/2009 12:29:08 AM | | Votes: 1

From Encarta: "Scientific Revolution, the period roughly between 1500 and 1700 during which the foundations of modern science were laid down in *Western Europe*. Before this period, nothing like science in the modern sense existed." ---- http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_701509067/scientific_revolution.html ---- And if you want to see who the major scientists are in each field, check out the Discovery Channel's "100 Greatest Discoveries" videos that are all over the web.
— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/3/2009 12:59:10 AM | | Votes: 1

TurboSpyder, most of the scientific revolution discoveries came together with industrial revolution. I think there weren't German's scientific and math tools necessary for industrial revolution when it occured in early 1700s in Britain. And in Germany invention of calculus hadn't than practical application. There were also math and scientific inventions in various times in different places in the world but they also hadn't practical application.
— abcd (View Profile)

Posted on 2/3/2009 4:34:09 AM | | Votes: 1

abcd, if you enter university today to study engineering, you are required to take calculus courses in your first semesters. Engineers like Thomas Newcomen and James Watt were key people in the development of the industrial revolution in Britain in the early 1700s - did they need or use calculus back then? I don't know the answer to that but today you can't engineer much of anything without it. Here are some contributions that German mathematicians made in the 1500s. ---- "The first half of the sixteenth century saw a flurry of German algebras, among the most important of which were the Coss (1525) of Christoph Rudol~(ca. 1500 ca. 1545), the Rechnung (1527) of Peter Apian (1495-1552), and the Arithmetica integra (1544) of Michael Stifel (ca. 1487-1567). The first Is especially significant as one of the earliest printed works to make use of decimal fractions, as well as of the modern symbol for roots; the second is worth recalling for the fact that here, in a commercial arithmetic, the so-called "Pascal triangle" was printed on the title page, almost a century before Pascal was born. The third work, Stifel's Arithmetica integra, was the most important of all the sixteenth-century German algebras. It, too, includes the Pascal triangle, but it is more significant for its treatment of negative numbers, radicals, and powers. Through the use of negative coefficients in equations, Stifel was able to reduce the multiplicity of cases of quadratic equations to what appeared to be a single form; but he had to explain, under a special rule, when to use + and when—. Moreover, even he failed to admit negative numbers as roots of an equation. Stifel, a onetime monk turned itinerant Lutheran preacher, and for a time Professor of Mathematics at Jena, was one of the many writers who popularized the "German" symbols + and—at the expense of the "Italian" p and m notation. He was thoroughly familiar with the properties of negative numbers, despite the fact that he called them "numeri absurdi." About irrational numbers he was somewhat hesitant, saying that they are "hidden under some sort of cloud of infinitude." Again calling attention to the relations between arithmetic and geometric progressions, as had Chuquet for powers of two from 0 to 20, Stifel extended the table to include 2^-1 = 1/2 and 2^-2 = 1/4 and 2^-3 = 1/8 (without, however, using exponential notations). For powers of the unknown quantity in algebra Stifel in Arithmetica integra used abbreviations for the German words coss, zensus, cubus, and zenzizensus; but in a later treatise, De algorithmi numerorum cossicorum, he proposed using a single letter for the unknown and repeating the letter for higher powers of the unknown, a scheme later employed by Harriot.7 -- From the book “A History of Mathematics”. -- Btw, Thomas Harriot was British mathematician.
— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/3/2009 12:06:04 PM | | Votes: 1

From the same book "A History of Mathematics" http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/584/ahistoryofmathematicskj6.jpg
— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 2/3/2009 12:30:54 PM | | Votes: 1

I used to think audi's advertising was humorous, now it seems a bit desperate. They want to be on top with the big boys from Germany, but have a looooooooooooong way to go. Making fun of the established brands that actually sell here isn't the way to do it.

Maybe the competition should fire back. Make an ad where an audi is parked next to a VW, and the driver cant figure out which is theirs. Or show some an audi spinning 'round and 'round like a tea cup ride because the idiot owner felt quattro made him invincible.....
— tattedtwice (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 10:35:44 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 5

No, whoever is behind this should be fired. Insulting the competition rarely works, if ever, unless it's very funny.
— S4cabriofoxone (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 10:54:23 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 3

Audi seems pretty desperate. They keep trying and trying and still can't even break the 90,000 sales mark in USA. Didn't Infiniti outsell them?

That "luxury toyota" has been handing their asses to them all these years now. Insulting the competition could work, maybe, if you're the best already, but if you're trying to steal customers, why would you insult them?
— DinamoR (View Profile)

Posted on 2/1/2009 11:15:45 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -7

This is the most poorly written thread I have ever seen.
— nsmatt (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 1:05:25 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: 3

it's funny to me. if any brand was to do the same and be pretty damn accurate, i would love their commercial. for example, like tattedtwice said in his post about the tea cup, that would actually be a funny damn commercial and i love the Audi brand. why wouldn't i like this one? Go Audi!!!
— 1dott8 (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 1:10:17 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -4

As for the comments that I am reading here, I am stomped by; A- Lack of education B- lack of knowledge C- blatant fanboism.
Most of you simply missed the point, Audi is not "attacking" the competition. If you had not A, B or C in your head, you would have seen that Audi is saying that M-B was "The luxury" brand in the 70's, BMW was "it" in the 80's and Lexus was in the 90's. We are now well into the 00's and it is Audi's turn. I can appreciate that you disagree with the delivery of the message, that the video clip is not to your taste or whatever you may think but to not see this message or to refuse to see this message, well, refer to A, B or C and pick one or all.
This is what progress is all about, but you need an open mind, and many here don't have that.

This ad is to be followed by this:http://www.truthinengineering.com/a6

Audi did start slowly with the R8 last year, where people actually thought they were not brave enough to show a specific brand.

The A4 commercials started to show more, a E-class first and then a IS, 3 series and C-class. The respond to those commercials have been positive. That was followed by the "viral commercial" "meet the Beckers". This was done also to test the waters, I think. It must have good because here we are with a similar concept with a twist on the timeline.

Everybody knows those "cliche", perception is reality in this World. Like it or not. And again, by reading some of your comments, Audi is being proven right. It is amazing to read your comments and see how far you will go to put Audi down and defend your brand. You take yourselves way too seriously. As an example, I'll take the Hyundai commercial, I thought that was hilarious. Do I think that Hyundai is dreaming if they are seeing themselves going after Lexus and BMW?
Absolutely not, it is called progress. Are they going to succeed? Who knows, people were making fun of Lexus when they arrived here. The fact that they are still making fun of it in Europe is another discussion though.

An open mind is always better.

— 1evlaudi (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 1:18:04 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -2

Lexus really was in during the 1990's. It took almost a decade for germans to catch up to the quality and luxury of Lexus after Lexus seriously bitch-slapeed them early on. But the ES? C'mon now we all know that is not why Lexus became popular. And it's not like Audi is not selling some cheap rebadged VW's. So yeah I'd call that an insult.

Audi has never been 'in'. Doubt that will change no matter how much they attack competition.
— DinamoR (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 2:47:36 AM | | Votes: -4

Very long post to make little sense. Audi is part of VW and like any other large company they tested the waters prior to putting this ad out. No one here is taking the ad personally its an ad, not a good one but just an ad. The difference is in order to actually get people to want an Audi maybe show what they can do over the competition show some substance, simply misleading the customer by saying that the competition has done nothing through the years while Audi innovates, and creates new technologies shows they really arent even worth looking at because anyone that has an ounce of intelligence isnt going to believe that. Most never even consider Audi when shopping for a luxury car, and Audi is aware of this. Yet all I keep seeing in ads from Audi is a loose message of try something new, the competition is pretentious dont be the same by us lol. Is anyone to take that serious, you say they arent attacking the competition being pretentious was never a compliment, neither is saying toyota claiming to be luxury, or mercedes was in because it had no competition. In turn buy doing they just simply insult the people they want to buy their cars, which wont work, and show nothing at all about what makes Audis worth buying over what is our top 3 brands BMW, Mercedes, and Lexus its like saying buy us because we are a luxury company that isnt pretentious, or pretending but we will stoop low enough to insult established brands and their owners lol. Good luck Audi, but a 13 year old could have came up with the ad campaign.
— bmwdrvr (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 10:14:23 AM | | Votes: 4

I would hardly call an Audi as progress from a BMW or Mercedes.

They are great looking cars, but not my first choice.
— adamsaf723 (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 1:53:19 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -3

Actually I would say Audi is a revelation compared to BMW and MB. Which premium brand is ACTUALLY growing? Hmm, neither BMW and MB and Lexus is no competition to Audi on global scale. Get your facts straight fannieboys.
— VISO (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 11:06:09 AM | | Votes: -5

Audi is nothing more than a POS VW with extra chrome.
— 3pointstar (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 3:52:57 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -3

And you win the idiot award of the day.
— VISO (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 11:08:30 AM | | Votes: -5

How about Audi being late to SUVs(Q7 being fist), late at introducing 300BHP+ 6 cylinder engine(now 3.0 supercharged), had no real coupe for years(before A5), hybrids(they don't have any), RWD(again no no) and many others. Every company contributed something or the other, Audi making fun actually themselves looking foolish.

JUGNU
— JUGNU (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 5:28:08 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: 4

The Q7 doing better than expected.
Late to introduce a 300HP+ engine??
Hmmmmm... can you say B5 RS4???
No real Coupe??? O.K.....wow....
Audi was the first manufacturer back in the mid 90's to show off 3 different Hybrids (Audi Duo), but at the time, no one cared.
Inifiniti/ Nissan does not have any hybrids... so what, you gonna slam them too?? and Jaguar, and all the others but Lexus and Honda?
Of course you left out the good things that Audi offers.
— AlexTx (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 10:52:59 AM | | Votes: -3

Yawn, this is like a 00J post with poor grammar & spelling
— aarononymous (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 9:36:32 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -2

Case in point... keep it coming, the jugnu and 3 pointstar and others, your ignorance and blindness makes us laugh.
— 1evlaudi (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 9:49:46 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -6

LOL,

I thought the ad was great. As a former owner of two BMWs I thought the playful poke at the 80's-vintage BMW 5-series (and ultimate yuppie accessory) was funny, but the pink Lexus from the 90's was hilarious!

I think that what Audi is saying is that all luxury marques have their "decade in the sun", and that Audi will be top dog for the first decade of the new century. That leaves one nagging question - what will happen in the "teens"? And I notice that they didn't spoof the Cadillacs of the 1960s. But then, considering the sorry state of Audi itself in the 60's, can you blame them?

LOL - I'm getting too deep for a comment on a 1-minute car ad. Enjoy the ad; I certainly did. It was almost as funny as the 3-D "Sobe" ad with Matt Light, Ray Lewis & Justin Tuck dancing the female roles in "Swan Lake" in their underwear (with tutus added for good measure)!
— Audiphile (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 11:49:26 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: -4

There were only 3 car companies runing Super Bowl ads this year - Audi, Hyundai and Toyota. Doesn't say much for the state of the American auto market, does it?

I thought the Audi ad and the Hyundai "angry bosses" ad were funny. But if the Toyota Venza ad is a harbinger of Toyota's prospects for the next few years, Toyota is in big big trouble! What a dull, unimaginative ad!
— Audiphile (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 2:18:40 PM | | Votes: -4

Audi has nothing to lose.They are trying to get back on the shoping list.Infiniti is not mentioned because they are minor league.
— truthpursuit (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 5:22:33 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -1

To the ones of you saying that Audi is not on anybody shopping list, I think you should do some research and subscribe to magazines like Autonews or autointell that are reserved for professionals and you will be surprised to learn that the buyer consideration for Audi is up to 54% compare to Lexus 68%, when Audi was at 37% 3 years ago and it is worth noting that Lexus slipped 1 point last year. Not a big thing but a first in 20 years. Once again, instead of making a fool out of yourself, why don't you do some intelligent research and post some educated comment.
— 1evlaudi (View Profile)

Posted on 2/2/2009 11:22:11 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -6

This has turned into a Audis ar good/bad argument which is not the question. Having had both Audis and BMWs in my book the Prince of Darkness haunts both, but so what? Irrelevant to this question.

The question is is this an effective ad. The fact that it is causing comment all over says it is. Showroom traffic will increase (it doesn't have to double, even a 10% increase is a big deal) and at the end of the day they will sell some more cars. Isn't that what an ad is supposed to do?
— Krazeeddd (View Profile)

Posted on 2/5/2009 10:58:07 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: 2

Add your Comments

Images hosted in your AgentSpace can now be posted in the comments section using the following syntax (case matters): [img]IMAGE URL[/img]
Example: [img]http://agent001.myautospies.com/images/sample.jpg[/img]

Email Me When Someone Replies To My Message

Audi's new marketing insult the Competition will this work??

About the Author

User Comments

Add your Comments

Submit an article

Photo Galleries

Cars

Autoshows

Latest Articles