by Mike Gulett –
Advertisers have used beautiful women to sell just about everything since the beginning of advertising, well actually since before advertising. And it still works today.
This is true even if the buyer is a women but it works especially well when the buyer is a man. Here are some car advertisements that were mostly originally published in the 1950s, 1960s or 1970s.
The Jaguar XKE ad below is self explanatory – drive an XKE and get the girl.
The automobile industry has a strong incentive for using women to sell cars to men because of the special relationship men have with their cars. OK, I am in over my head on this stuff but you know what I mean.
MG is really trying hard in this groovy ad below.
The main feature in the 1969 Ford Thunderbird ad below is the sunroof. But yet they are offering the sun, the moon and the stars in addition to turning the car into the shape of a beautiful woman.
Subliminal advertising does work!
The Citroen advertisement below implies that if one drives a Citroen then Jane Birkin will go along for the ride. Or maybe Jane Birkin will drive, either way it would have been fun.
Below is a Chevrolet Camaro advertisement and when this man sees how his lady looks at him he knows that he bought the right car. You can tell he knows by the self confident expression on his face.
I forget what the ad below is selling, I think it is after market soft tops. I bet it worked.
Fiberfab made fiberglass bodies to turn your VW or certain British car into a super car. Beautiful bodies by Fiberfab is a slogan just begging for a girl in a bikini.
This Borgward ad is classy yet it was not enough to save this German car manufacturer from the fate of almost every car company that ever existed.
Triumph created many advertisements featuring women, below are two for the TR7, below that is an ad for the Spitfire and then an ad for the TR6. Notice a pattern?
I wrote once that I always wanted to be this guy in the Spitfire ad below, so I bought a TR6.
A pretty lady, a Triumph TR6 and some guy
The women in this Aston Martin Rapide photo below are stylish and classy just like the car.
When Chevrolet says “Genuine Chevrolet Accessories” do you think they really meant that the lovely lady is an accessory? This was 1952 after all.
A women who flies a jet fighter must drive a cool car too like the Lancia Stratos Zero concept, oh yeah.
Below are some advertisements and brochures sent in by readers with some more of my own added.
Ivan Ruiz sent in the advertisement below from a dealer in Beverly Hills featuring a Maserati Ghibli and an Intermeccanica Italia. If you read the text in the lower right hand corner you see that this dealer also sold Isos. I think the lady in the Ghibli has removed her bikini top.
Maserati Ghibli and Intermeccanica Italia Advertisement
I remember this TV advertisement below sent in by Christian Harm. It reflects the cultural thinking of the day (1970) – “You Could Be Dodge Material”.
In the Dodge brochure below the woman looks like she walked off the set of one of the old TV series “Dallas” or “Falcon Crest”.
1974 Dodge Advertisemsnt
The French were a little more risqué with their advertisements for Citroen. These two below were sent in by Simon – editing provided by me.
Below is another Citroen photo with Jane Birkin.
The 1968 Holden Monaro GTS brochure from Australia has this interesting photo below. What is the lady wearing?
Below are photos from an Iso brochure suggested by Byron LaMotte. Nice huh?
Iso Grifo
Iso Grifo and a mini skirt
A pretty face and the 1969 Pontiac
Plenty of leg room for your special lady in this 1970 Chevrolet
Let us know what you think in the Comments.
The surfer girls are a key part of this Ford Van Advertisement from 1976
Instruments anyone?
Another Triumph TR6 ad with a pretty lady
When the Bizzarrini at the top of this page was new it frequently matched most of these situations .
I thin k the Thunderbird ad is using this technique of laying a glass prism over the stock photo to stretch the car out and make it longer, lower and wider. I ran across these prisms (I am using that word because I don’t know what they were called. they were about 3″ wide, 6″ long and half an inch thick) in a newspaper photo lab about a half century ago. This was way before the computer had been in vented.
This is a great one, Mike! Of course, the irony is that, while guys love beautiful cars and women (sometimes equally, it seems!) the women themselves are generally less stimulated by the machinery. They just know that cars are pretty good guy bait. And so it goes.
Larry
Ironically, back in the late 60’s and 70’s when I could not afford those expensive cars I had no problem attracting women.
And now that I own expensive euro classics…
It doesn’t makes sense does it?
Denise sort of explained it in “Brooks Too Broad For Leaping.” Of a group of guys standing around, staring at an engine, she said, “It’s as close as they can get to becoming pregnant.”
Before we met, my wife, Petra, always disdaining cars. But we ended up writing a whole book together … about a car! And she now knows the difference between, say, a Ferrari and a Corvette. Secretly, though, I think she’s still pretty blasé about the whole deal!
Yep, defies understanding.
Seems the Citroën ads would get the most attention along with the Fiberfab and Triumph. There were many I remember. They are due for a come back don’t you think?