Kia, which plugged its electric EV6 in last year’s game, for this year’s ad will highlight its gas-powered 2023 Telluride X-Pro, said Kia America Marketing Vice President Russell Wager. He did not disclose creative details on the ad from agency David&Goliath. Kia was one of a few brands to increase market share last year and is riding a hot streak after posting sales records for December and the fourth quarter, as reported by Automotive News.
Wager, in an interview with Ad Age, an Automotive News affiiate, acknowledged that some supply issues remain.
“We still can’t make enough to meet the demand,” he said. But making Super Bowl decisions based on today’s supply is “a short-term game,” he said. “We’re doing it to keep our [brand] top of mind, to keep people putting us onto their consideration list three, six, 12 months down the road.”
Kia had the same conversation last year when it opted to highlight the EV6 in the Super Bowl. While Kia “sold over 20,000 of them, you don’t go into the Super Bowl sell 20,000 cars,” he said. “You go into the Super Bowl to say, ‘Hey, we are a serious competitor when you think about electrified vehicles.’”
Kia’s sibling automaker Hyundai — which has not advertised in the Super Bowl since 2020 — is opting to highlight one of its EVs with ads running during this weekend’s AFC and NFC championship games, rather than in the Big Game.
The brand will pay about one-third the cost of a Super Bowl ad (which this year is running as high as $7 million for 30 seconds), but still get in front of a huge audience, said Angela Zepeda, chief marketing officer at Hyundai Motor America. (Last year’s championship games averaged 49 million viewers, while the Super Bowl drew about 100 million.)
Hyundai’s campaign features its electric Ioniq 6 and stars actor Kevin Bacon and his daughter, Sosie Bacon.
One ad, called “Your Dad Is Going Electric,” is meant to normalize EVs, even for dads who might not be as technologically savvy as their kids. It comes from creative agency Innocean with Canvas handling the media buys.
