Recently I’ve noticed a lot of negative feedback from Chevrolet’s Silverado commercial that was aimed at targeting farmers.
The commercial tells the story of a hardworking farmer who is checking his herd of Longhorn cattle in the middle of a rainstorm. The farmer notices a broken fence and a missing calf. He climbs into his 2014 Chevy Silverado and searches as long as it takes until he finds the missing calf.
The flaw in the commercial being the farmer finds a Holstein calf.
If you log onto YouTube you can read the comments from farmers and ranchers across the country, many people are upset that Chevy doesn’t understand their targeted audience or know the difference between cattle breeds.
Yes, any good company should know and understand their target audience and do a little research but isn’t there at least some positive from this commercial? At least farmers and ranchers are being recognized on a national level. So many times our industry is scrutinized by people who don’t understand what it is we do. This commercial shows a farmer doing every thing in his power to save the calf, demonstrating to a large audience that farmers do care for the wellbeing of their farm animals despite what animal activist groups may try to portray. It was definitely a pull-at-the-heart-strings ad.
Maybe running this ad was strictly strategic for Chevy. Perhaps Chevy is trying to step up to the plate the way Dodge did with their 2013 Super Bowl commercial. Are other manufacturers trying to do the same? Even Toyota and Ford have commercials geared toward farmers. Maybe everyone is trying to join the “Year of the Farmer” movement.
Farmers and ranchers buy trucks and it only makes sense for truck manufacturers to target farmers and ranchers. So should we expect these manufactures to understand our lifestyle and know how to produce accurate commercials?
We would assume that they understand what it is we are looking for in a farm vehicle as they design and build working trucks that are expected to pull their weight on our farms. But it’s probably a safe bet that the people designing and building these trucks are not the same people designing the ads.
And who knows maybe with all the negative feedback Chevy will do a little more research before airing their next ad about farmers resulting in a few more people who understand our industry. There is always a positive light in every situation; we just have to choose to see it that way.
Best wishes,
