Source: USA Today
Kia brings back its hamsters in a big ad push for the Soul EV, an electric vehicle that might serve only as an eco statement and sell neither widely nor in big numbers.
The hamster characters have hawked the small, boxy gasoline-power Soul well enough since its 2009 introduction that it's the brand's second-best-selling U.S. model. The critters haven't been featured in the South Korean automaker's broadcast ads since the 2013 "totally transformed" campaign, in which they became fitness buffs to launch the second-generation Soul.
Starting on the MTV network's Video Music Awards show Sunday (9 ET/8 CT), the creatures return in unexpectedly sexy fashion in a 60-second spot. Two geekish hamsters working in the lab to transform a gasoline Soul into an EV manage to create a leggy female hamster, as well.
The ad taps into "geek chic," says Michael Sprague, executive vice president in charge of Kia's marketing and advertising in the U.S. And the spot uses new music by Maroon5, aimed, he says, at the same modern, young crowd that exults geeks.
The song in the ad, "Animals," can be downloaded free, starting 9:01 p.m. (PT) today (12:01 Friday ET), at Kia.com, by the first 200,000 who show up, Sprague said.
"The Soul EV is lifting the entire brand," Sprague said. "It will serve as the focus of our Clean Mobility campaign."
He said studies showed that "consumers were rejecting us because they were perceiving us as environmentally unfriendly because we didn't offer a hybrid. So we offered a hybrid. Then consumers said their expectations had changed and we weren't offering an electric vehicle. So now we're offering an electric vehicle."
The gas-electric hybrid is the Optima sedan hybrid. The 2014 model Optima hybrid -- along with the electric Soul -- was unveiled at the Chicago auto show in February. Kia is selling about 1,000 Optima hybrids a month.
Hyundai sells about twice as many Sonata hybrids, mechanically similar to the Kia. Toyota Prius, the iconic hybrid, notches roughly 20,000 sales a month lately.
Officially Soul EV, going on sale in this quarter for an as-yet-unannounced price, is Kia's "first-ever mass-marketed electric vehicle." Realistically, it might never become a mass-market machine.
"Our initial strategy is to launch in California, then Oregon, then move to the East Coast, New York, Maryland, so on. Then we will assess the demand across the country," Sprague says.
It's been typical of automakers to offer EVs in states requiring them, to amass "zero emission" clean-air credits. The commitment has been similar to Kia's -- if sales are strong, the cars go nationwide. That almost never happens.
Kia forecasts a real-world driving range of 80 to 100 miles, similar to claims by other all-electric models.
Benchmark mass-market plug-in electric in the U.S. is the Nissan Leaf, widely promoted and distributed. It snags about 2,000 buyers a month.
Sprague won't say if the car will make a profit. Most electrics don't.
In fact, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles CEO Sergio Marchionne said earlier this year that he hoped nobody bought the company's Fiat 500e battery car "because every time I sell one it costs me $14,000."
Sprague: "We're taking the long-term view on this. The more we sell the more credits we get.".
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