Our work with General Motors.
Making electric vehicles accessible to everyone.
Insight.
Americans have been conditioned to be skeptical of climate change generally and electric vehicles specifically.
Despite Tesla’s media presence, sales of electric vehicles in the US account for 2% of the market (Edmunds) - mostly in coastal elites.
When America’s largest automaker, General Motors, decided to shift from fossil fuels to electric vehicles, with a $27 billion commitment to sell zero-emission-only vehicles by 2035, the company needed a complete overhaul of public opinion for itself and the category. We needed to drive mass adoption of electric vehicles and explain why GM is the company to put everyone in an EV. We needed everybody in: Wall Street and Main Street.
The GM problem: GM was losing the EV public relations battle.
The EV problem: EV’s were stuck between “The Tesla effect” (EVs were elitist), and “The Prius Effect” (EVs were a compromise).
The strategy: Recontextualize the category to make it exciting and entertaining. Demonstrate GM as the #1 innovator. We made a hero out of the Ultium battery platform, GM’s revolutionary technology, shared the story at CES and the Super Bowl. Our rally cry, “Everybody In,” showed that GM is the company that will deliver the future of the automobile.
Case study.
“There are moments in history when everything changes. Such a point is here for the mass adoption of electric vehicles. We have the solutions, capability, technology and scale to put everyone in an EV. Our new brand identity reflects this.”
Global Chief Marketing Officer
GM
Deborah Wahl
“It is no secret that society is at an inflection point. So is General Motors. We could not be more proud to have been a part of their journey.”
Global Business Lead
Grant Theron
