Lexus Drives to the Jagged Edge
By STUART ELLIOTT
Drinking and driving do not mix. Is that why Lexus is shattering a Champagne glass in a new commercial?
No, not really. The spot, scheduled to begin running on Wednesday, is meant to demonstrate the “pursuit of perfection,” to quote the Lexus slogan, in a new way.
The commercial features a new Lexus model, the two-seat LFA, a so-called supercar. But the spot is intended to burnish the Lexus brand image as much as to sell the new car since only 500 of the two-seaters are to be produced.
The Champagne flute breaks in the commercial as a result of the sound of the IFA’s engine being revved up. A physicist was hired, Lexus says, to help determine the type of glass whose natural resonance frequency matched the frequency of the engine noise, which causes the glass to vibrate until it breaks.
Fans of the Lexus brand will recall a couple of previous times that glassware played leading parts in the brand’s pitches. A pyramid of Champagne glasses on a hood helped Toyota Motor introduce the Lexus luxury marque in 1989.
And in 2006, a commercial showed a LS 460 being parallel-parked with its park-assist feature, thereby keeping intact two giant pyramids of Champagne glasses.
Lexus is breaking out — pun intended — the glassware again to introduce a campaign that carries the theme “Engineering the impossible.”
Lexus first official LFA commercial! "Pitch"
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