Ford Thinks its OK To Be Gay (and Rich) - Sells Them JagUars

DETROIT, Dec 17, 2002; Reuters reported that Ford Motor Co. announced on Tuesday a U.S. advertising campaign aimed at pitching Jaguar cars to gay buyers, noting the group's wealth and taste for luxury goods.

"Typically consumers in that market tend to have high disposable income and they tend to have a higher tendency toward luxury brands in general ... Jaguar is a very natural fit," said Simon Sproule, chief spokesman for Ford's luxury Jaguar, Land Rover and Aston Martin brands in North America.

The world's second-largest automaker said the campaign, starting this month and running until April, would target homosexual and bisexual consumers through print ads that appear primarily in publications like Out magazine and The Advocate.

"It's a first for us and we're pretty excited about it. We think there's a lot of upside potential," Sproule told Reuters.

Ford and other Detroit automakers or their foreign nameplates have advertised to homosexual markets outside the United States for some time now, but forays with ads tailored for gay consumers in the U.S. market have been rare.

Gay-specific advertising would seem to make sound business sense, however, especially at a time when U.S. auto sales are slowing. Ford estimates the homosexual market at more than 14 million consumers with a buying power of more than $450 billion.

The first print ad Ford is set to run as part of its campaign, created by Prime Access Inc. of New York, features images of winding country roads and the words "Life is full of twists and turns."

Inset, alongside the question "Care for a partner?" is a picture of a lone young man and a separate image of a gleaming Jaguar X-Type sedan.

"The ideal companion takes many forms," the ad says.

It's a far cry from the macho swagger normally featured in advertising for America's car and truck makers.

Mike Wilke, head of the Commercial Closet Association, a New York group that tracks advertising in the gay marketplace, criticized the ad as a bit too soft, saying the buzzword "partner" was the only thing that signaled something outside the mainstream.

But Wilke added that the ad was something of a breakthrough nonetheless. "What is significant about it is that it is the first gay-specific American car company ad in this country," Wilke said.

EXTENSIVE RESEARCH

Wesley Combs of Washington, D.C.-based Witeck-Combs Communications, a marketing and public relations firm that was instrumental in developing Ford's gay-marketing and advertising strategy, said it was based on insights gained through a proprietary online market research study of more than 1,000 gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender consumers, along with 1,000 general population consumers.

"This ad was the result of extensive research and it was selected because of what the research told us about this market and about what this market preferred, how they like to be best spoken to," Combs said.

In addition to the Jaguar ads he said Ford, which had invested perhaps more resources than any other company to understand the gay market, would be targeting it through a direct mail and event sponsorship campaign going foward.