Toyota Commercial Is Everything Wrong With Automakers

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I can’t believe they actually made this…

Last week, Toyota USA dropped an awesome new commercial called The Focus Group. The ad is supposed to get you excited for the 2022 Toyota GR86, what you might have known before as simply the Toyota 86 or the Scion FR-S. However, the commercial exposes one of the many things wrong with modern automakers, whether that was part of the point or not. It’s actually rather genius and something I watched multiple times while sending to other people so they could enjoy a good laugh.

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If you caught the Toyota Supra commercial called The Pitch released last June, this is in the same vein. It features the same two people from Toyota Gazoo Racing pitching a commercial idea for the sports car to two “suits” or Toyota executives. The executives seem to think the GR people are pitching gimmicky, cheap ideas when what they’re trying to sell in the commercial is excitement and fun. Those are the reasons people buy performance vehicles, which is why it’s so hilarious when automakers try to portray rather pedestrian, boring vehicles like the Hyundai Elantra in that light.

This time around the GR people and the executives are sitting on the other side of a one-way mirror while a focus group watches two very different Toyota GR86 commercials. One is boring and focuses on the practical features of the sports car, while the other shows it racing through an abandoned shopping mall.

Toyota certainly has been guilty of being a little too uptight in the past two decades or so. The company gets beat up for that a lot, with many enthusiasts sadly just mouthing what automotive sites and magazines have told them to think about the brand. However, they’re hardly the only ones in this industry guilty of being out of touch with what the people want.