In the late 1960s, Plymouth cracked the youth market wide open with a bold new marketing and branding strategy: Using familiar cartoon characters to sell muscle cars. See Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner battle it out here.
The Road Runner, Plymouth’s 1968 entry in the Motor City’s muscle car wars, was based on two fresh but powerful insights about the exploding youth performance market.
First: Many young muscle car buyers, it turned out, cared little about luxury or convenience features. They wanted the most powerful drivetrain they could afford, crammed into the simplest, cheapest package available. By addressing this desire, Plymouth was able to offer the lowest-priced muscle car on the market, with a list price comfortably under $3,000—including the standard 383 CID big-block V8 and Hurst-shifted four-speed transmission. Planning to sell 20,000 units that first year, Chrysler sold 50,000.
Next: Plymouth recognized that this crop of young buyers didn’t identify with couples in evening wear or weekends at the country club, so those familiar images were banished from the television and print ads. To reach the first generation of car buyers raised in front of the TV set, Plymouth borrowed and licensed (for $50,000, it is said) a beloved character from Saturday morning cartoons, the Road Runner. The quick and crafty bird was then applied not only to the car’s ad campaign, but to the branding of the vehicle itself.
As we all know, when the Road Runner and his nemesis Wile E. Coyote face off in a Warner Bros. cartoon, Road Runner always wins. And that’s just how it went in a whole series of Plymouth commercials, too, including this spot from 1969. There’s even an Acme Rocket Skate bit here. Enjoy.
I always thought Chrysler must have paid a pretty penny for that character. $50g’s today is almost $350K. I had a friend with a ’69 RR, and while it was pretty fast, it really was a bare bones, tinny car. It did, however, have the “meep-meep” horn.
That’s what it was intended to be. Bare bones sedan with plenty of muscle. Radio was an option. Some even had a full front bench seat with a 4 speed manual tranny on the floor. It looked strange especially with the cheap looking vinyl seat. If you wanted luxury and power then you bought the GTX.
Exactly. Rubber floor mats!
I was a dyed in the wool, thirteen year old Ford guy when the Roadrunner was introduced. I went crazy for it and worked on my dad incessantly to buy one. Our tri-power Pontiac was cool but it was time for a change. Finally, the magic Saturday morning came with the buying trip to the Chrysler-Plymouth dealership. I can still sense the acute pain I felt when my dad ended up striking a deal on a leftover Fury III four door sedan with a two barrel 318.
I greatly enjoy your views on the history of the auto industry. Insightful and succinct.
I remember well the Road Runner commercials, a big influence on a 10 year old kid. Also remember the first Road Runner I ever saw, a guy in high school had it in about 72, a 68 or 69 model with the 383 4 speed and bench seat. He blew the 383 up, bought a 440 out of a wrecked police car, and ran the heck out of it. There was another guy had one a few years later that for a long time was the fastest car in the county. It had a unmistakable red, white,and blue paint job that was just as beautiful as the car was fast. A friend of mine that knew the guy said when he went to race somebody, he would put his left foot up on the seat and kick the clutch with every shift. He seldom lost, even with his unorthodox driving style!