- Jeep is reusing footage from its popular Super Bowl commercial to encourage people to stay home during the coronavirus situation.
- Jeep is reusing footage from its popular Super Bowl commercial to encourage people to stay home during the coronavirus situation. (Get it?)
Right now, millions of people around the world are seeing what they can make with things they have on hand. Dinner and art projects are all coming together based on what’s been hiding in the back of the closet. Turns out, automakers are using the same trick to get new ads out the door. Which is why Bill Murray—playing Phil Connors from the 1993 movie Groundhog Day—is back again in a commercial that reuses footage from the bard’s Super Bowl Jeep Gladiator commercial that aired earlier this year. This time, the footage has been tweaked with an eye toward the reality that all of our days can feel like they’re on repeat right now. The message: we should be staying home for now, if possible, and then we can have fun again later.
The short, 26-second ad is a simple affair. Called “Same Day,” the ad starts with Phil waking up and the classic Sonny and Cher song “I Got You Babe” starting up (again). But this time, instead of trying all sorts of different adventures as he did in the movie and the previous commercial, Phil just stays in bed. The ad says, “We understand that every day is starting to feel the same. Stay home. Stay healthy. When this is over the trails will be waiting.”
Murray let Fiat Chrysler Automobiles reuse the commercial footage free of charge, according to FCA chief marketing officer Olivier François and CNBC. “Not only was [Murray] okay with it, he actively participated on the creative,” including ideas for two of the three ads, François told CNBC.
The ad uses Jeep’s new hashtag, #StayOffTheRoad, which has also shown up in the brand’s other coronavirus-inspired ads. There’s one where the iconic grille openings are turned into what look like prison bars that open up into the interior of a closed garage. That one says, “With a little patience, the views will get better.”
Other brands in the FCA stable have also released variations on the “Stay at Home” theme, including Ram’s “Work for Home” message and Dodge’s connection between its muscle cars and the “muscle” of those “first responders and others on the frontline of the pandemic,” the company said in a statement. Fiat’s COVID-19 hashtag is #MorePowerfulInPark.
