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Right before AIDS and Reagan ruined the party, the early 1980s were a time of meaningless random sex, 20% inflation, sub-100-horsepower midsize sedans, Quaaludes, and— most of all— mountains of white powder (in imagination, not in the reality of the ’81 recession). This ad for the 1981 Ford Mustang captures the spirit of its time.
Right down to the sanitized cover of the Donna Summer song and the 80-pound Mustang owner, it’s all here. Hot stuff, baby!
19 Comments on “Adventures In Marketing: The Cocainiest Car Ad of All Time!...”
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Heading to Studio 54?
During the early ’80’s either “Time” or “Newsweek” magazine (I forgot which), ran a cover story on cocaine – the new drug of the jet set. The article mentioned the fact that cocaine was not addictive……..
I’m not sure pure coke was addictive. That changed when they started cutting it up with trucker speed.
Pure cocaine, particularly when injected or when taken in freebase form, is about as addictive as drugs get. Folks can get addicted to powdered cocaine as well, though I personally think that it’s way overrated. Some personality types, though, seem to be attracted to it.
She’s driving with her highbeams on.
Yeah, I noticed she wasn’t wearing a bra too.
;-)
Ladies and gentlemen give it up for pig_iron! He’ll be here all week and be sure to tip your servers because they are working hard for you.
Good night!
A small thin blonde and new Mustang? I’d have been living large.
IIRC 1981 was pretty much still in the “if it feels good, do it” generation. So was I. Now, not so much. Glad it’s yesterday instead of tomorrow.
I still miss it. Only for me it started nine years earlier; acid was the drug of choice, not cocaine; and I wore more makeup than she did.
If that Mustang had the anemic 2.3 4 cylinder coupled to an automatic, it would have had trouble getting up to 60 mph in 30 minutes despite the advantage of an 80 lb driver.
I wonder how much she weighs now?
The V8 in ’81 was a 255 with something like 119HP! I had a ’79 pace car with the same wheels as in this commercial. It had a 139HP 302.
My 1999 Civic has a 98 Cubic Inch engine and 106HP!
As for the blond? Bowling for Soup answers a lot of questions for us children of the eighties. To wit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K38xNqZvBJI
A great homage to my coming of age. Thanks for sharing.
Pretty nice EPA numbers, there.
…and the Diamond Blue mercedes W108 at 021 belonged to the Ad producer.
What, no mention of the “unique” Michelin TRX wheel/tire concept, in the very nearly unobtainable size of 390mm?
Michelin tire dealers needed their coke fix too
I suspect it was Michelin’s OEM Account Executives that were supplying Ford, BMW, Citroen, Renault, Peugeot, and Ferrari product managers with mountains of indoor Aspen lift lines in exchange for selling out their customers by fitting TRX specific wheels to their cars.