The test-drive. It’s the most defining part of any car-buying experience. More than a price or a spec sheet, a test-drive can determine whether a car passes muster and may be labeled a worthy purchase. The snap judgments that we make while testing a car ultimately define it to us and mark it as either a quality vehicle or an abysmal one.
Bearing this in mind, Chevrolet has debuted a new series of advertisements for the new Corvette Stingray that focus exclusively on the experience of test-driving it. However, these test-drives aren’t exactly what you might think.
In these drives, the cars are testing their drivers.
Chevy has released a Vimeo series showing different notable individuals, from pop culture blogger Terry McFly to famous Slows Bar BQ owner Phillip Cooley, attached to a wide range of biometric apparatus as they test-drive the bowtie brand’s latest track devouring monster.
Each driver had various biometric factors measured throughout each lap of Spring Mountain Motorsports Ranch, including heart rate, respiration and brain activity, which were then compared visually to the telemetric data spit out by the cars’ onboard computers and sensors.
By displaying this information, Chevy hopes to prove once and for all exactly how exciting the Corvette can be. The folks that developed this latest iteration of the Corvette, the perennial punching bag for big name performance brands like Porsche and BMW, believe that this latest model not only stands toe to toe with halo cars like the 911 and M3, but that it actually surpasses them in many ways.
Whether or not the advertisements prove that is entirely up for debate. What isn’t up for debate, however, is the level of ingenuity displayed by ad agency Commonwealth and production company B-Reel in their development of the concept and advertisement.
By radically inverting the traditional test-drive that is so often featured in automotive advertising, Chevy has found itself with a radical new marketing tool to push its new halo car. Whether this will translate directly to increased sales remains to be seen. But until the sales numbers come in for the latest quarter, Chevy can take solace in the knowledge that they’ve put out what is arguably one of the most wildly inventive automotive ads in recent memory.
