{"id":70745,"date":"2009-05-20T16:37:24","date_gmt":"2009-05-20T15:37:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/insight\/the-beetle-and-the-american\/"},"modified":"2009-05-20T16:37:24","modified_gmt":"2009-05-20T15:37:24","slug":"the-beetle-and-the-american","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/us\/insight\/the-beetle-and-the-american\/","title":{"rendered":"Corporate Stories: The Beetle and the American"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Every business has its own story. Over the next six weeks, we&#039;ll be looking at some of the inspirational, lucky and humorous stories of the world&#039;s best known brands. First up: Volkswagen.<\/p>\n<p>Before 1959, Volkswagen had had a chequered history, tainted by associations with Hitler, and not exactly loved by consumers outside Germany.<\/p>\n<p>In 1950s America, car ads were all about horsepower, glory, the American Dream. How would a small, ugly (or cute) German car named after an insect, penetrate the market?<\/p>\n<p>A small New York agency called Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB) had the answer: a series of simple, witty press ads that completely undermined conventional automotive advertising and how consumers thought about cars.<\/p>\n<p>Headlines such as &#039;Live Below Your Means&#039; and &#039;Think Small&#039; introduced the car buying public to a new way of looking at vehicles. DDB&#039;s strategy was not to sell the brand to an uninterested audience, but to create a loyal following of brand ambassadors who would disseminate messages of economy, reliability and sound engineering which were implied (never stated) in the ads.<\/p>\n<p>The Beetle campaign spawned a whole series of iconic ads, all bearing the humorous, self-mocking tone of voice, and helped VW become the most popular foreign car brand in the US through the 1960s.<\/p>\n<p>At Stratton Craig, we&#039;re professional storytellers. We can help you tell your story, and win new affection for your brand among your target market.<\/p>\n<p>To find out more about what we can do for you, please call us on 0117 937 1383, email <a href=\"mailto:storytelling@strattoncraig.co.uk\">storytelling@strattoncraig.co.uk<\/a> or visit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/us\/\">strattoncraig.co.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every business has its own story. Over the next six weeks, we&#039;ll be looking at some of the inspirational, lucky and humorous stories of the world&#039;s best known brands. First up: Volkswagen. Before 1959, Volkswagen had had a chequered history, tainted by associations with Hitler, and not exactly loved by consumers outside Germany. In 1950s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[271,314],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-automotive-copywriting-us","category-copywriting-us"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Corporate Stories: The Beetle and the American - Stratton Craig - Global Copywriting &amp; Content Marketing Agency<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/us\/insight\/the-beetle-and-the-american\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Corporate Stories: The Beetle and the American - Stratton Craig - Global Copywriting &amp; Content Marketing Agency\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Every business has its own story. Over the next six weeks, we&#039;ll be looking at some of the inspirational, lucky and humorous stories of the world&#039;s best known brands. First up: Volkswagen. Before 1959, Volkswagen had had a chequered history, tainted by associations with Hitler, and not exactly loved by consumers outside Germany. 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