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Avenue of the Giants Weekend Run - Sat. March 23, 2024

Saturday will be a very full day of cruising from Novato up through the Avenue of the Giants and ending at Eel River Brewing in Fortuna. Sun...

Adweek Venerates MINIs' "Win Small" Ad Campaign

Adweek makes BSSP's MINI "Win Small" advertising its Ad Of The Day for July 24, 2012.  It says, in part:
. . . Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners—which recently kept the business after a mandatory review—is playing up the vehicles' diminutive stature with an attitude-driven, Olympics-themed montage about the upside of being outsized by the competition. "Small is a long shot. Small is fearless. Small works harder," argues on-screen copy. Punk band Living Things' "Bombs Below" revs up the ad, directed by Tool's Geordie Stephens, another in the long tradition of car commercials that maybe wish they were music videos.

The visuals are quick cuts: A short boy faces off against a tall boy on a dirt backyard soccer pitch. A short mixed martial arts fighter faces off against a tall one in a dark cage. A short basketball player faces off against a tall one. Those sports-themed shots are interspersed with footage of Minis, naturally, and clips that allude to the time-honored underdog mantle Mini is assuming: David vs. Goliath, Popeye vs. Bluto, and … Beaver vs. Bear? "Small wins our hearts," says the copy's punch line, the ad's real point. Translation: You know you love us, even though (or perhaps sometimes because) we're pint-sized. It's a fun, confident execution of a fittingly defiant strategy for the BMW-owned brand, which has earned iconic status despite selling relatively few units.

"Win small," says the ad's less-sensical, less-resonant tagline. Actually, Olympians—and the fans they represent—don't really want to win small. They want to win big, even if Mini is trying to sell little cars.
If you have not yet seen it here is the video -