It’s no secret that Volvo has leaned heavily on imagery to advertise its cars over the years. There was the magazine ad that showed 7 Volvos stacked one on top of the other, with the tagline “Are you in the market for a hardtop?” Then there was the ad with a box truck sitting on top of a Volvo 700 series car, with the tagline “How well does your car stand up to heavy traffic?” So, when Volvo decided to recreate a monster truck event by lining up a series of cars and seeing how many of the surrounding vehicles were crushed compared to the Volvo 200 series, no one was surprised. The other vehicles included a Plymouth Valiant, a Ford Pinto, a Ford Maverick, and an Audi 100LS. It turns out that — unknown to the ad agency — the playing field had been a little less than level. The Volvo had been reinforced, while all the other cards had been weakened for the stunt. Ultimately, the results were disastrous for Volvo, and their ad agency of 20 years had to resign in shame. Volvo faced investigation by the FTC and the Texas Attorney General. The sad fact is that without any modifications, the Volvo would probably still have fared better than the other cars anyway, and the car manufacturer would not have faced public shame. Volvo learned a valuable lesson: If it’s 98% good enough, it usually isn’t worth risking everything to make it 2% better.
