It’s been a while since Chevrolet aired a new installment of its “Real People, Not Actors” commercials, a series of ads in which a sandy-haired man presents some pretty loaded questions to a focus group of regular folks who aren’t actors (or are they?).
But this Thursday, the bowtie brand will resurrect its temporarily dormant marketing campaign by airing two new television spots that promote the 2016 Chevy Silverado’s built-in 4G LTE Wi-Fi… and the Ford F-150’s lack of built-in 4G LTE Wi-Fi.
A 45-second ad and a shorter 15-second spot promoting the benefits of OnStar 4G LTE connectivity will be introduced on New Year’s Eve. But you can watch both now, back to back, in the video below:
The ad, entitled “Mobile Office,” juxtaposes the Silverado’s built-in WiFi with a Ford F-150 that doesn’t offer WiFi, but is pulling a trailer filled with old-school office accouterments, including a fax machine and a kindly secretary named Dolores. All of the participants shown opt for the high-tech Silverado, though, betraying an unwarranted lack of faith in Dolores’ abilities.
“The spot illustrates just one aspect of the connectivity Chevrolet offers our owners,” said Paul Edwards, vice president of Chevrolet Marketing. “Based on usage rates for features such as OnStar, 4G LTE, and RemoteLink, Chevrolet’s technologies deliver real-world benefits for our customers – and are a competitive advantage for our brand.”
According to GM, Chevy has sold over 1.4 million vehicles with 4G LTE connectivity since June 2014, more than 500,000 of which were Silverado, Silverado HD, and Colorado pickups.
No word yet on how many trailers/Doloreses have been purchased by F-150 drivers over that same time period.
Patrick Grieve was born in Southwestern Ohio and has lived there all of his life, with the exception of a few years spent getting a Creative Writing degree in Southeastern Ohio. He loves to take road trips, sometimes to places as distant as Northeastern or even Northwestern Ohio. Patrick also enjoys old movies, shopping at thrift stores, going to ballgames, writing about those things, and watching Law & Order reruns. He just watches the original series, though, none of the spin-offs. And also only the ones they made before Jerry Orbach died. Season five was really the peak, in his opinion. See more articles by Patrick.