BOC Week 10 - The Volkswagen Lemon Ad

Advertising a product wasn’t as broad and humorous back in the day as it is today. In early 1960’s, “ads were either information based on lacking in persuasiveness, more fantasy than reality, or relied on the medium’s ability to deliver a repeated exposure. Beetle ads, connected with consumers on an emotional level, also conveyed a product benefit in a way consumers could relate to.” (http://www.syl.com/bc/advertisingcampaignforvolkswagenbeetletheno1advertisingcampaignofthecentury.html). The Volkswagen Lemon Ad broke that trend in various ways. Americans refer to the word “lemon” as being ridiculously bad but they weren’t implying that the car was terrible; instead, they were saying the overall vehicle’s long-lasting value and the constructive engineering was phenomenal.

They had to break through the “big car” culture of Americans by issuing this smaller car that brings more benefits than the bigger cars. While conveying that message, they had to produce a unique way to get the point across through the advertisement. “The ad agency, Doyle Dane Bernbach, successfully caught the viewer’s attention by using self-effacing humor. With any luck, these ads drew you into the joke, and you would read the rest of the copy looking for the punch line.” (http://designhistorylab.com/?p=1755). “The ad featured a black and white photo of the Volkswagen Beetle with the word 'Lemon' in bold san serif font…that this particular car was rejected…because of a blemish on the chrome piece of the glove box. The ad goes on to describe the rigorous inspection process…” (http://www.writingfordesigners.com/?p=1731).

They interpreted the words “thinking small” through their design by making the ad fairly small with a lot of dead space making the viewer more interested. They compared a Volkswagen to a lemon to represent how small the vehicle actually is. By doing so, this ad successfully became one of the most famous ads ever.