“No one wants to be unpopular. That’s why we’re here. That’s the dance of advertising. We help people become popular. Through popularity comes acceptance. Acceptance leads to assimilation. Assimilation leads to bliss. We calm and reassure. We embrace people with the message that we’re all in it together, that our leaders are infallible, and that there is nothing — absolutely nothing — wrong. That is what we do. It’s what we’ve always done…In return for our humanitarian service, we are made rich.”
The above quote is from the fictional Miles Drentell, an advertising agency owner and boss of the main character on the loved/hated eighties television show Thirtysomething. Drentell is a brilliant and quirky sociopath who will spout out lines such as “The decimalization of time is so arbitrary,” and whatever you think of the show, his character is a perfect encapsulation of a corporate leader who knows exactly how to manipulate his employees to make them manipulate the public for financial gain. If you hate the main characters on Thirtysomething, you’ll love Miles.
An agency handed the Saab account in the eighties would have found it difficult to help the brand become popular and accepted in the Miles mode. A car with the ignition key on the floor and a backward-opening hood does not speak to mainstream acceptance. What can be done? You double down on the weird; you make it look like it’s the popular and accepted competition that has it all wrong:
The herd is following the typical symbols of success for upwardly mobile professionals in the early eighties; we can see a Volvo 245DL wagon, an E28 BMW, and a paunchy S130 Z car. The Z seems a rather odd choice, but I must say that my parent’s driveway in 1984 did indeed hold 200-series wagon and a Z, albeit an earlier S30 280Z. So much for transcending stereotypes.
As much as it seems like the advertisement is going against the grain described by Miles Drentell, the fact is that it’s going a step beyond. The copy says that by purchasing a Saab you’ll be infinitely better than those that are perceived as “popular;” you’re joining a group of people who wouldn’t be caught dead in a BMW, individuals who listened to Tom Waits, ate at Ethiopian restaurants and occasionally smoked weed in their mid-century homes.
Saab’s advertising during this time was outstanding, and like we were taught in sales training they go for your “pain points”. These ads know the issues you have as a middle-aged professional, and they offer a solution to all of them:
Or even better in this one, where Saab claims that they had to turn buyers away for their cars, and they “even sold the yellow ones” last year:
Obviously, a niche player is a niche player, and ultimately profits seem to center on being as many things to as many people as possible. Saab’s death a few decades later was inevitable, but their ad agency did an admirable job of keeping them as successful as possible. It’s also rather inevitable that as iconoclastic machines, these Saabs would eventually become one of the Most Autopian Vehicles ever. If there’s one thing better than being popular, it’s being effortlessly cool.
A Saab 900 turbo is one of the many vehicles in my imaginary Frank Wrench’s garage.
I am no longer a BMW fan after owning a modern one, but a family member has an E28 B9 Alpina and a B7 Turbo, those are fantastic cars from when BMW made genuinely reliable vehicles. Now I get the Alpina wasn’t an “everyman’s” car, but still, the E28 bones they’re built on is a great generation.
As someone with three kids, a mortgage, and hefty orthodontia bills, I do, in fact, enjoy driving my Saab 900 S.
With the Saab cropped out, the top image looks like a sheep funeral march.
Let’s ignore the Saab for a second. These sheep do have good taste. If I had to choose between any Saab and a E28…
I loved the character of Miles Drentell..but then I was 30 something at the time…
“When thirtysomething was on the air, the question, “Who is Miles Drentell based on?” became a topic of mild interest in the media and especially within the advertising profession. It was adman Jay Chiat, who designed the Energizer Bunny campaign and operated out of a Frank Gehry building in Venice, Calif., that was outfitted with Pop Art and cardboard furniture. No, it was Bob Kuperman, who worked for Chiat. No, it was superagent Mike Ovitz. No, it was William Drenttel, an old friend of Zwick’s and partner in a design firm whose Web page begins with the Zenlike riddle, “We love design. We hate design.” To Chatterbox, Miles bears an intriguing resemblance to Jerry Brown when he was governor of California. Of course, Miles is really none of these people. He is Miles Drentell.”
Easily one of my favorite TV characters. At a time when every show had hippies and suspender-clad yuppies, Miles transcended it all by being an evil capitalist with great taste that dabbled in eastern mysticism. Also a superb, terrifying manipulator.
The second dealer I worked at had most of the demonstrated market covered with Saab, Volvo and Datsun. The following stint in strange market coverage was a VW/Saab dealer in Dearborn, MI. There I got to service and test drive a Euro spec Scirocco owned by the Ford Motor Company. This was well before the US release and all techs wanted a go.
Those 900s are getting thin on the ground here. Saw a workaday daily-drive last week and had to tell my bil about it.
Still a fair few waxed red ones seen on the weekends, but a white survivor looking around 250-300k miles are pretty much gone.
On a positive note, have been noticing more newer brown vehicles amongst the grey sameness
Or recognizing and embracing one’s own dorkiness.
Saabs are great, but that top photo has the makings for an excellent 3-car garage. A 245 wagon, a Z-car, and an E-28 BMW.
Sign me up!
My middle-aged butt was formed by 30 years and over 500,000 miles in the driver’s seat of a mid-eighties Saab 900 Turbo. Wish I still had it. The Saab, not the butt.
No, you wish you had your smaller mid-eighties butt, as we all likely do.
I thought SAAB had jets in all their commercials?
I always regret not buying that 9-5 Aero. That was a car with character. Also ventilated seats.
Do it! You still can! Hell, a non-Aero 9-5 will still take an Aero tune and Aero suspension. Just saying.