This ad ran in Spring-Summer 1965, about 3½ years before the Plymouth Superbird’s name was surely finalised. Pure chance, nudged a little by the limited number of possible [superlative] + [animal] Mad Lib car names…? (Wildcat, Superbird, Hyperferret, etc)
Or could there’ve been a Looks like GM didn’t trademark it, so »yoink!« moment?
Yeah, never heard of a “Buick” Superbird. One rare beast.
Being both a ’65 Skylark owner and an ad collector, this is an ad that is in heavy rotation on display in my “ad room.” My favorite ’65 GS ad, however, labels the GS “a howitzer with windshield wipers.” Great line, even greater hyperbole: Most of the road tests clocked the GS at about 16 seconds in the quarter mile. Then again, they were mostly 2-speed ST300-equipped, along with 3.23 gears, a far cry from the typical GTO road tests with 3.90s and a 4-speed (and most likely some Royal Pontiac tuning). Buick didn’t seem to get advertising like Jim Wangers and Pontiac did.
I don’t see that Superbird is the name of this car. The ad states twice that it is a Skylark Gran Sport. Superbird is more of a description that makes one word out of two. Its in reference to the name Skylark.
Correct. It’s just a descriptor applied to the Skylark GS. It’s not a name.
…yes, that’s true.
But to the point, I think that if this ad had happened after 1970, the lawyers might have had something to say about it. Whether or not it was a name actually given to the car.
Great to see an ad that gets right to the specifics. Also great to see print ads with creative design. Many people related to advertising would freak at the flush right copy, and large white space to the left. Thinking that valuable space needed to be filled with content. When the cleanliness and simplicity of the ad, is a large part of its appeal. So much departure here from 1950s car ads.
“Go back and do it again! I am not paying you for all that empty space!”
Pretty much. As ad agencies grow, they try to dump those clients ASAP.
Speaking of negative space, don’t be eating or drinking while you read this, or you’re liable to choke. I can’t be held responsible.
Haha, that’s hilarious! So close to reality, it is alarming.
When I was meeting clients, and making a design brief for myself and/or other designers, you wouldn’t believe how hard I worked to try to pick up every nuance and fine detail in communication (including body language), as they expressed their requirements. The aim being to please the art director and client as early (and cost effectively) as possible. The goal was to produce winning concepts early, without giving the client too many choices. That’s an invitation for things to go awry. Didn’t want to waste their advertising dollar either, knowing they were spending upwards of $100-$150 an hour, back then. You win some, you lose some with clients.
That’s why the simplicity of this Gran Sport ad is so appealing. It gets right to the essence of the attraction of this car. And doesn’t exhaust the energy of the client, or agency personnel. Would be fun to create.
Thanks for that link Daniel, you are full of surprises!
That is flipping brilliant! Yes, it’s good I wasn’t eating.
Barely apropos, we have two cats.
In 1966 GMC started calling their larger gasoline V-6’s ‘Magnums’, at least a year before Dodge started using the name on their high performance engines. GMC had a ‘Magnum V-6’ emblem on some trucks into the 70’s.
Woo-Hoo! An all synchro 3 speed! Surely to goodness a 4 speed was optional. Even if there was enough power/torque to overcome that missing gear, the image of a “4 on the floor” was what everyone wanted, at least in this segment. 3 speeds were for grandpa’s Nash.
The best part about that all-synchro three-speed is that it was called the “Dearborn” three-speed. Yep, GM bought them from old Ford Motor Company and used them in big Catalinas and even the Skylark GS.
Daniel, it’s good to see you back.
Way back in my tune-up/lube tech days, I was intrigued and amused by the decals GM put on their air-filter housings.
Bearing in mind that Canadian Pontiacs used Chevy drivetrains, I was interested to see that Chevy 327s had “Turbofire” decals, whereas Pontiac 327s said “Astroflash”.
Chevy inline-6s sometimes had a “Turbothrift” decal; I don’t think I ever saw an inline-6 in a Pontiac, and thus no “Astrothrift”.
A fine and underused prefix was “Strato”, with a tip of the hat to Boeing’s B-47 and B-52. Didn’t someone make a Stratocruiser wagon or something?
Yes, it was an orsomething. Boeing built it.
Yes, I knew that – cranial flatulence on my part.
The Boeing 377 Stratocruiser was featured prominently in the wonderful 1959 edition of “Dennis the Menace goes to Hawaii” comic book.
The great Al Wiseman did a beautiful job on the artwork.
Found it!
Wow, that’s an artefact!
Yes, I had a battered used copy as a child, and paid 100x the cover price for a minty one a few years ago.
I would have thought that by 1959 they would travel by jet – a Boeing 707 I suppose.
Pontiac’s base-model full-size car in Canada for years was called the Strato-Chief. Still my favourite car model name of all-time. And a whole heck of a lot more fun than modern “names” like, say, ML320CDI.
Yes! A high school friend had a battered ’68 in faded silvery blue. It was Pontiac’s Biscayne equivalent.
Thanks for the reminder.
More foreshadowing:
there’ve???? JFC!
What is the question or problem, Mr. Kennedy?
There’ve been any number of people over the years who object to contractions.
Oh! That’s all? I couldn’t’ve known, so thanks for pointing that out. I’m so relieved; I’d’ve been worried if it’d’ve been a real objection; if there’d’ve been any substance to it.
I don’t think much about ad design. Thanks to the Daniels for an illuminating discussion. After illumination, the pattern is clear. The picture shows zoom lines, and the text is also zoom lines from a car speeding off to the right.