Are These New Volvo Ads Cutting Edge or Simply Stupid?

It's cutting edge stupid! lol

agreed, But they also need to attract younger buyers as a brand, who may be put off at the fact of inheriting their parents old 1990 Volvo station wagon. If they make their ads too Buick-like, I don't think anybody would buy it.

I also like, but not love the C30.

Volvo is making every attempt they can to get away from the stuffy/boring European image they have had for years. With the C30 they are trying to break into a new market that is currently being dominated by cars like the VW GTI, Audi A3 and the MINI Cooper S.
Several people faulted VW for the "safe happens" line of commercials, but they generated huge amounts of buzz from people talking about the commercials. Everytime I turned on Fox News and even the local news, everyone was talking about VW.
I think you might see the same thing with Volvo.

aahhh!

.....that's a terrible picture you described for us, Wilco. I'll have nightmares!!

where is it?

THANK GOD it's animated. I thought it was going to be "real"
lol

Not a bad idea, but poorly executed... Creating divisiveness for a niche car in a niche brand could work; as long as the people who love it, really love it. The "tomato throwing" commercial suggests a unanimous hatred for the car. Cutting to another young, hip crowd equally enthusiastic would have created and reinforced the "it’s not for everybody" image that Volvo seemed to establish in the past.

Overall, the "What’s your opinion?" message gets lost in the surreal antics of the ads. The "grandmother" ad looked as though it could have been selling cereal to kids... just replace the car with a box of Brand A Sugar Flakes. If Volvo wanted to go bold and convey honesty in opinions, they should set up a car and a camera on a busy street somewhere and allow people to record their varied reactions. Then edit and air the most entertaining opinions, (or whatever is most conducive to their intended message), and spend the commercial (agency) money on a well-crafted website where people can share their opinions on different aspects of the car.

Ok, so there’s an “Applause” ad to counter the tomato throwing (Thanks for the link, Wilco). Still, Volvo should be wary about what these ads say about Volvo. There’s good reason why Toyota separated Scion into a separate brand. If Volvo wants their S80 image to compete with the 5, E class and GS, these ads are not serving the brand well.

Advertisers have to attract in anyway. That is why you see commercials which have no relation with the product. You see the typical commercial is now tuned out by the average buyer, especially younger people (who have seen so many commercials that it affects them less). So if Volvo puts something ridiculous and disgusting on air (as Wilco mentioned above) that, even that gets attention. So the main thing is to make people at least the brand and better if the product, it doesn't matter how stupid it looks. Now putting down your own brand that is different from other companies and there are only two results to this type of advertising: 1. It will be a huge success. 2. It will be a complete failure.

One more thing, in Volvo case there can be a good marketing campaign, but it may still bust. The reason why is because the C 30 will be a tad bit more expensive than other econoboxes and maybe not better than the GTI (More expensive than Japanese offerings and Rabbit, and probably not as good as the GTI). In this market I would choose the Audi A3. The product it self may pose a problem rather than the ad campaign.

Anyway, we'll see what happens :).

I like the C 30 btw. But if I were to look for a car in this segment I'd probably take the Mazdaspeed 3, or on the European side a GTI/A3.