10 of the Best Automotive Taglines

Still the most inspiring, smartest and best.

I always loved this line and tried to sell-it back into Nissan a number of times.

When this was launched with its brilliant ramp line, "There are passengers and there are drivers, Drivers Wanted," I said game-over. That is simply awesome.

The magic here was that this German tagline was launched and ran in the UK. The line is loosely translated to, "Progress through Technology." The magic was that a tagline expressed in the German language in an English-speaking country gave the brand instant "German engineering" credentials. And a chance to assert leadership over more established German rivals like Mercedes-Benz and BMW.

At the time this line launched back in the late 1970s, early '80s, Ford and the other Detroit brands were getting destroyed in sales by the Japanese marques like Nissan, Toyota and Honda. The reason? Quality. Detroit just couldn't match it. The line played off the factory concept of "Job 1." In this context, "Job 1" was all about focus. On quality. For the makers of the Fords. The sellers of the cars and trucks. And ultimately for the buyers.

That about sums it up. Effortless. Timeless.

This line didn't last long. Volvo departed from their long-time safety positioning to tout their design and performance credentials. It was a mistake. Sales fell. Volvo, for all its incredible attributes, is known for safety. And it's still one of the top three reasons people buy cars and suvs. "Drive Safely" was conversational. And the phrase reached iconic status as the words that appear on a giant New Jersey storage container that's visible in the opening credits of The Sopranos.

The line, along with the accompanying Bob Seger song summed up and positioned Chevy trucks magnificently. I could't even tell you Chevy's tagline today. And every time I see a Chevy truck commercial, the song still pops into my head. An iconic line that's also "ear-conic."

This was clever. A way to tackle the age-old problem of Detroit not stacking up to its competitors from Japan, Europe and increasingly South Korea. The Eminem Super Bowl spot that launched it was one of the best Big Game commercials of all time.

This was another short-lived bit of brilliance. How do you get someone to think about a Hyundai over a Honda? Think about it. Exactly. There was also a very smart launch campaign that posed wonderfully provocative questions like, "Shouldn't a car company have more airbags than cupholders?" Then there was a call to action to ThinkAboutIt.com. Hyundai could run this today and truly dominate. What's their tagline today? Think about it.

I heard this line from my old boss, Lee Clow. He said the agency pitched this line to Honda, but still lost the business. The new agency, Needham, Harper & Steers used a variation of the line. It was: Honda. "We Make it Simple." I like the "philosophy" line better. Incidentally, Chiat/Day was the ad agency. They wound up winning the Nissan business and wrote the remarkable tagline 2 listed above.