How Ballerinas, an Astronaut, and a Tiger Launched Kia in India
Automakers have been punished over the years for venturing too far into the abstract. Infiniti still takes occasional beatdowns for its 1987 launch campaign featuring rocks, water, and trees but no cars.
Kia is in no such danger with its new campaign to introduce the brand in India, where it is also building a production facility capable of building 300,000 cars annually. The anthemic 60-second launch spot has drawn some 300 million views and counting on social media.
So why has the spot performed so well?
For one thing, it grabs your attention and makes you smile. It opens with twirling ballerinas passing a red Slinky from hand to hand. A moon-landing-era astronaut floats down to plant a wedge-soled boot repeatedly in a circle of moon dust while heading a soccer ball at a constant stream of soccer players doing full-rotation bicycle kicks to send it bounding back to him. Meanwhile, a hummingbird activates an early-days-of-animation flipbook showing Felix the Cat walking and whistling a tune.
The action culminates with a red Kia Stinger GT emerging from a bank of fog into a more real-world design studio as an announcer intones, "What happens when magical inspirations come together? You get stunning Kia designs."
There’s a fun kicker at the end, too, when a Lion King–inspired meerkat pops up and in a very British accent interrupts a designer deep in thought. "Hello. Sorry," it says. "Did I inspire you?"
The end frame features a Kia logo and the legend, "The Power to Surprise."
Part of the spot's effectiveness is the dreamlike world it conjures. Much easier to talk about than to pull off. Full congratulations to the team at agency Innocean Worldwide India and the brilliant execution of director Vijay Sawant and the Hungry Films production house.
Another major factor is an incredibly catchy instrumental track. According to AdWeek, it has already accounted for 55,000 downloads. YouTube comments include, "Who's only here for the music?" And: "Specially visited this ad just for the awsm music!!"
But there's method to the madness as well. Each of the fanciful elements is a metaphor for the things you hear in every car ad that usually put you to sleep. A more conventional presentation-you've seen it a million times-would feature beauty shots of the car driving on the road with a voiceover that hit the same notes, but not nearly so cleverly:
"The graceful (ballerinas) 2019 Kia Stinger with launch control (astronaut) combines the impressive balance and athleticism (soccer players) of its electronically controlled multilink suspension and Brembo vented disc brakes with the thrilling power (tiger) of its twin-turbocharged 365-hp DOHC aluminum-block V-6 for a one-of-a-kind (hummingbird) driving experience . . ."
Hello? Hey, wake up. The boss is coming down the hall.
If you're not convinced of the spot's brilliance, compare the Indian execution with this U.S.-market spot from 2018, which is not a full apples-to-apples comparison (since it focuses on the 2018 Stinger GT rather than introducing the brand to a new market) but gives you a feel for how advertisers often take different approaches to different markets.
And just for the record, we liked the U.S. spot as well. Of course, how likely are we not to like a spot featuring Formula 1 and Indy 500 champion and all-around good guy Emerson Fittipaldi?
Two simple questions:
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