Virgin Imagery to Sell Used Cars Edit
BMW: You’re Not The First

Let’s be realistic: getting a BMW for a good price is like scoring with a beautiful woman, “You know you’re not the first.” But hey, not everyone is lucky to get first dibs on something so gorgeous. I am referring to the car of course. Focus your dirty mind!

Although the June 2008 ad is a bit unorthodox (remember, they are trying to sell you a used car!), I think it is wicked funny and I love its sarcastic tone. Kudos to BBDO Athens. The team includes creative director Theodossis Papanikolaou, art director David Kaneen, and a very sharp copy by Daphne Patrikiou.

In order to see how refreshing this ad is, let’s have a look at a very boring used BMW car campaign by Change Communications in Warsaw, Poland. The March 2008 campaign promotes that the cars are, “Barely driven” with the use of seemingly new BMW cars in the ads. One car had a little stone stuck to the wheel, another had a tiny splash of mud, while the third had a little bug stuck near the headlights. Ummm…. so that’s how good these used BMW cars are. 

The uninspired campaign is the work of creative directors Jakub Korolczuk, Ryszard Sroka, art director Rafał Ryś, copywriter Maciej Klimek, and photographer Peter Hetzmannseder.

If we combine the copies from both campaigns, we get something like: You’re not the first, but it’s barely driven…