Fiat’s
stumbling relaunch in North America has suffered its
worst week yet as its lead advertising agency was
dropped, a new television spot featuring singer
Jennifer Lopez was widely ridiculed, and the penny
finally dropped amongst its new dealers that Alfa
Romeo’s own proposed US relaunch is something that
is always a plan for the future, not a proposition
to base a business plan around.
With the
relaunch of Fiat in the United States lacking much
in the way of serious planning or boasting a
sufficient budget, it was always going to be a
difficult prospect.
However, matters have
not been helped by a stream of negative publicity
that has homed in on issues of competency, which in
turn is now harming the brand’s resurgent U.S.
image. Sales of the 500 in North America are running
at half projections, and stalled in August at just
over 3,000 units, almost the same as Fiat managed in
July.
At the same
time as sales are losing their upwards momentum,
Fiat’s dealers have been dismayed by news from a
presentation at the UBS investor conference in
Frankfurt that Alfa Romeo’s return to the U.S. has
been put off until at least 2013 and in all
likelihood 2014 – although even these dates are just
the latest in a saga that has stretched on for over
a decade. Fiat’s swathe of new dealers were given
the impression that they would be able to add Alfa
Romeo to their new standalone showrooms – in which
they were obliged to invest hefty sums – from next
year. With Alfa Romeo planning its Stateside
relaunch annually ever since Fiat and GM’s ill-fated
tie-up in 2000, quite why the new Fiat dealers who
were forced to make substantial investments in
infrastructure, swallowed this line so
enthusiastically remains to be seen.
The Fiat
brand's problems in the US have culminated in a new
TV advert featuring actress and singer Jennifer
Lopez, which has provoked very mixed reactions.
Peter De Lorenzo, the respected former automotive
advertising and marketing executive, described the
advert (which Fiat terms a 'trailer') on his
autoextremist.com blog as “quite possibly the
worst automotive spot of the last decade, hands
down.” It has also been criticised for the mildly
creepy tagline, Like the car?/Go online/Like JLo?/Get
in line.
At the
very least, the advert is clumsy and
poorly-executed, and its ill-thought-out airtime
positioning during NFL coverage raised eyebrows
within the industry as a further demonstration of
the continuing lack of brand positioning awareness
that has plagued Fiat in recent years. Impatto, the
small Detroit agency handed responsibility for the
launch of the 500 by Fiat North America CEO Laura
Soave, has been given the boot amid advertising
industry rumours of an improper relationship between
Soave and its CEO Michael D’Antonio.
“We
are winding down our relationship with them,” Fiat
and Chrysler’s marketing chief Olivier François told
Advertising Age magazine this week. “There’s
no real marriage. I never, ever meet with them,
never met with the guy [Mr. D’Antonio]. My
understanding is that they are less of an
advertising agency and more of a strategic partner.”
Impatto seems to have somewhat been ill-prepared to
manage a brand launch and chose not to focus on key
attributes of the 500 such as its Italian heritage.
Chrysler Group has reportedly retrieved its assets
from Impatto and several media sources have reported
that a review is now being conducted. Media reports
say two experienced Chrysler executives have now
been brought in to ‘fight the fires’ at Fiat North
America, with one of them named by Automotive
News this week as Tim Kuniskis, head of Chrysler
brand product marketing. Several sources, including
Peter De Lorenzo, believe Soave has now been
relieved of much of her responsibilities. AdAge
quoted a Chrysler spokeswoman today as saying
noncommittally that, “To my knowledge, Laura is
still on board.”
Meanwhile, more negative publicity has been heaped
on the relaunch by a story in the New York Post
that claims a tie-up between Fiat and celebrity
website TMZ. The paper noted somewhat
unkindly that, “Fiat-Chrysler is so desperate to
sell its new revamped Fiat 500 it is discussing
pulling the trigger on a sleazy celebrity marketing
campaign that will pay paparazzi to photograph
unsuspecting stars they’ve set up with cars.”
According to the Post, Fiat executives were
“bragging about tying up with TMZ”. Under the
deal, Fiat was to hand cars to celebrities and would
the tip off the paparazzi who would then snap them
behind the wheel. One branding expert told the
Post: “There is such a powerful feeling against
paparazzi in Los Angeles... it’s a mistake for Fiat
and its agencies to cook up such a campaign, because
it could end up backfiring.”
