Ladies' Home Journal, Parenting, Better Homes & Gardens, In Style, Cookie Magazine, Cooking Light, Domino, Health, Home, Nick Jr. Magazine, Pregnancy, Self, Working Mother and Babytalk. In case you were thinking Mr. Karesh's review of the new all-new Dodge Caravan indicated that Chrysler is targeting its Man-Van at a male demographic, those are the mags that will feature ads for the people mover. And yet, this Sunday, right in the heart of NFL TV time, The Dodge Boys are running ads showing Man-Van family bonding (with Dad at the helm) to entice "young families" into their Caravan of love. Is Dodge having problems with its sexuality? Perhaps. Remember the brouhaha about the Dodge Caliber, the fairy and the [alleged] fairy? Another clue: at the same time it's rolling out it's Man-Van, Dodge is introducing their new tagline. They're trading "Grab Your Package And Drive a Muy Macho Dodge You Horny Bastard" (or something like that) to the deeply androgynous "Grab Life." Yes, and then what?
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There some ponytailed w*nker in America somewhere laughing their jacksie off because they convinced some executive at Chrysler to spend their money on their stupid advertising, rather than spending that money on making sure Chrysler’s cars don’t suck!
New man, old Chrysler…..
Does this mean the Subaru Tribeca is no longer the flying vagina for the industry?
Marketing Dodge to solely men was the stupidest move they could have made. Dodge is supposed to be the full line cars&trucks brand of chrysler. Not the “full line cars&trucks brand, but only for men, crap, that’s only 50% of the market, think we should bring back plymouth for the ladies?” Chrysler needs to re-luxurify itself as a brand, and de-testosterone dodge so it can serve the full market. People talk about GM and Ford’s brands being out of alignment, no one is as bad as Chrysler.
Oh dear, all this branding talk has me flushed. As silly as I think it is, Dodge’s foray into uber-macho automobiles is a great and successful branding move. It has firmly established itself as the brand of swaggering man-men with stubble and guns and such with aggressive uncompromisingly styled offerings laughably named like American Gladiators (Nitro???). Sell the Town & Country to Mom, the Caravan to Dad, and let them realize it’s the same car and decide from there. Keep the macho branding, until now it has been carried out quite well with an apparent singularity of purpose. Mindspace! Find it, fill it, and keep it!
Grab life? My a**.
HAHAHAHAHAHA
Excellent logo!
Insert obligatory sheep joke here…
At least the Ram is close-mouthed on the subject.
Chrysler needs to re-luxurify itself as a brand, and de-testosterone dodge so it can serve the full market.
Among Dodge’s many problems, I don’t see that as being one of them.
Designing cars for men is fine. While many men would have problems buying a “woman’s” car, women have no trouble migrating over to buy a “guy’s” car, and in fact may appeal to a niche of female buyers who want to buy such a thing. Automakers who have styled cars for women have flopped on their faces every time, but male-oriented designs are often appealing to women as well.
We see a similar phenomena with clothes. If a woman parades around the house in the shirts and shorts of the opposite sex, it can be kinda sexy. If a man were to do the same, then he signs up for membership for some transgendered rights organization and parades around with a stigma the size of Montana. It’s much safer to peddle male-oriented products and not the worst way to niche the market. I’m just not sure that there is a niche of any kind for the Dodge Stratus…
Soooo……
Does that make the new Dodge Avenger a transexual?
I guess the Sebring convertible would be a eunuch.
What is a car, anyway? Is is something you wear, or something you love and desire and want to do pleasurable things with?
If it is the former, then for (heterosexual) men a car should be masculine. After all, you don’t want to be wearing a dress. But if it is the latter, then a car should be feminine.
I am saying this in vague remembrance of J. Clarkson’s words, I think about the Dodge Viper. In effect, “being a heterosexual male, I find it hard to covet something that is as in-your-face masculine as a Viper”.
It’s a difficult topic, particularly in light of the recent foot-tapping business that makes me yearn for the good ole days in which the only scandals were about Presidents and their assistants. Still, whenever a company such as Dodge panders to my masculine side and stresses their butchness, I get a Village People feeling. (Not that there is *anything wrong* with the Village People).
I dunno. When the Magnum first came out, buyers were like 85% men. I doubt if Dodge (or Dodge dealers) are very in touch with their feminine side.
My point was not that taking the masculine niche by the horns was a bad play. My point was that Dodge is Chrysler’s only full line brand and that they risk severely alienating 50% of the market. That 50% would likely have bough camcords anyway I suppose.
Do you need a more masculine brand than Jeep? At least on the patriot and wrangler the masculinity is authentic. Dodge styling is the equivalent of stuffing a sock or two in your shorts.
Now all they need is a commercial featuring this refernce with that rapper guy Akon singing his Tap That song, and a new slogan, “we’ll let you Tap it before you buy it!”
Why buy the car if the ride is free?
That’s the funniest illustration I’ve seen in weeks.
With those “oviducts” leaking out into the peritoneal cavity, there’s no way in hell that Ram is ever getting pregnant.
Martin, you bring up a good point about the sexuality side of car things, complete with a very appropriate Clarkson quote.
I myself drive a Mazda Protege5, which i personify as a woman. I take care of her, drive her hard, etc, but at the end of the day she’s kinda cute and smiley looking. When looking for second car, the only thing I can consider is the Miata. The first generation Miata is cute, and the second generation is downright sexy (look at those curves). If one was to personify the Miata.. there’s no way in hell it would be a male persona.
Perhaps this is why nothing dodge has crapped out (I’m talking like.. since I was born in 1986) has appealed to me in any way. I like lightweight, lithe, agile cars/women.
So yeah, Dodge man-ifies all their cars, but yet Chrysler still makes nothing even remotely appealing to me. If I had to personify most Chryslers, they’re 300 pound middle-aged women with bad teeth.
Apparently to a lot of people – Madison Avenue (the metrosexual mecca) defines what is “manly” or “tough” or “masculine”.
And unfortunately John Q Public eats that up.
I stopped paying attention to the clueless hordes of advertising, pop culture, etc. a long time ago…
fahrvergnugen11: I couldn’t agree more.
Only insecure people need Mad Avenue et al to tell them what’s right.
“dodge is chryslers only full range brand”
I question the whole idea of full range brand, each brand needs an image and if you try to be all things to all people you end up being nothing to nobody.
I think the US needs guy-centric brands.
Other guy-centric brands: Porsche, GMC, and Ford trucks, which let’s face it, is really a stand-alone brand (does anyone buy a Probe based on F150 or vice versa?).
My suggestion is that Dodge have “regular-guy” centric brand as opposed to “dufus-guy” brand. Less bling, less huge-wheels, less 6000-lb truck for the sake of 6000-lb truck.
Yes, fahrvergnugen and Martin,
The marketers in Manhattan do define style for the vehicularly insecure. But remember, it is those insecure consumers who feel so good when they sit up in their SUV’s with their commanding view of the roadway…and that’s some big segment of the market.
On sexuality and cars. My experience has always been that certain cars attract certain kinds of girls:
When I was an undergrad I had a white Bunny convertible – chick car and chick magnet – it never failed to attract really cute girls…like Lee, who was cute, perky and creative.
I had Bimmers forever after school, they always attracted preppy girls…like Patty, who was cute, a bit less perky but from old money.
The SVX’s attracted weird, quirky girls…Michelle was the typical one with the SVX. She loved post-modern art, SAlsa dancing and trips to Vietnam.
The Ferrari attracted girls more expensive to keep than was the Cavallino Rampante itself…pick the Average 30-something Rhode Island female who has been married several times and can’t figure out why and you’ll understand.
By the time I got the Outback it was too late anyway: a girl had me followed by skis, horses, Airedales and a baby.
Now that I am single again, the Legacy GT attracts your basic, somewhat athletic all-rounders – which is pretty good for this stage of life.
The best girl car I ever had, though was the Alfa. A GT 2000. It attracted Jane who didn’t care what it was because it was cute and, well, if it didn’t feel like starting right now we could certainly find something to do together until it did feel like starting (I frequently didn’t mind the whims of Spica fuel injection). It is to my great dismay that I let both of those wonderful creatures (Jane and the Alfa) slip through my fingers.
All that Alfa talk makes me want to cry. I miss my Alfa spider and I am seriously thinking of getting an old GTV6. Man an old GT sounds so cool, except without the Spica fuel injection, talk about a pain to tune.
Ironically the Alfa is the most reliable car I have ever owned, 10 years and almost 200K miles.
Yeah!
It was cool!
Meaty Personal Wood-rimmed wheel.
These great headrests that cranked up out of the seatback. Again, on toothed wooden supports.
Dark blue with tan leatherette and the constant small of ethylene glycol (working on it’s endless mission to get into the oilways) and the Spica ambient temperature adjustment lever that you could fiddle with and, Viola!, she’d start up again. God! What a ride!
How is any of this different from automakers (all, not just Dodge, not just the Not So Big 3) marketing SUVs as Minivans That Dad Can Drive Without Shame, third-row seating and all? Aside from the logo, of course…
After all, if you’re going to drive the thing in Baja carrying all your stuff, who needs the All Important Third Row Seating?
Tom.