The Chevron Cars are
anthropomorphic
Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology.
Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics t ...
vehicles who were part of an advertising campaign of the
Chevron Corporation
Chevron Corporation is an American multinational energy corporation. The second-largest direct descendant of Standard Oil, and originally known as the Standard Oil Company of California (shortened to Socal or CalSo), it is headquartered in S ...
consisting of television spots, print ads, billboards, and toy cars available at Chevron retail locations.
History
Their debut in television commercials on May 1, 1995, featured talking cars done in
clay animation
Clay animation or claymation, sometimes plasticine animation, is one of many forms of stop-motion animation. Each animated piece, either character or background, is "deformable"—made of a malleable substance, usually plasticine clay.
Tra ...
, with a variety of car colors each with different personalities. The commercials themselves, done in a similar fashion to ''
Creature Comforts
''Creature Comforts'' is a British adult stop-motion comedy mockumentary franchise originating in a 1989 British humorous animated short film of the same name. The film matched animated zoo animals with a soundtrack of people talking about th ...
'', were crafted by
Aardman Animations
Aardman Animations Limited (also known as Aardman Studios, simply Aardman or Aardman Animation and stylised as AARDMAN as of 2022) is a British animation studio based in Bristol, England. It is known for films made using stop-motion and clay an ...
and used to promote Chevron with
Techron
Techron is a patented fuel additive developed by Chevron Corporation and sold in its fuel operations (including Texaco and Caltex). It contains a polyether amine-based detergent, which is purported to dissolve deposits in automotive engines and pr ...
. A year later, Chevron gas stations began selling the toy cars featured in the commercials. Chevron underestimated demand in 1997 and increased production to 700,000 on each of 4 or 5 new models at the time, compared to 500,000 in the previous year.
Although originally designed for children, Chevron executives were surprised that adults started collecting the toy plastic cars as well. Older adults are among the most enthusiastic collectors of the Chevron Cars.
On October 2, 2001, Chevron issued the limited edition Hope car to raise awareness about the fight for a cure for breast cancer and raised about $300,000 in donations. This has been followed by a new breast cancer awareness each October through 2007 with profits going to relevant charities.
In 2007, Chevron began limited production of cars in association with major commercial sports and university teams based on their Victor E. Van car.
On July 26, 2011, Chevron announced that due to decreasing consumer demand, the production of the Chevron Cars would be discontinued.
This brought to an end a period of fifteen years in which they were produced and sold.
Credits
The television ads were designed by advertising agency Young and Rubicam. The internet strategy, digital brand extension and the ecommerce component was created and managed by San Francisco web developer ISL Consulting, now part of ClearMetrics, Inc. ISL Consulting also developed the original Chevron.com corporate website as well as numerous other web-based initiatives for the various Chevron operating companies.
Popular culture
The Chevron Cars television ads have been parodied in several television shows, including ''
Robot Chicken
''Robot Chicken'' is an American adult animated stop motion sketch comedy television series, created and executive produced for Adult Swim by Seth Green and Matthew Senreich along with co-head writers Douglas Goldstein and Tom Root. The writers, ...
'', the animated comedy ''
Family Guy
''Family Guy'' is an American animated sitcom originally conceived and created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The show centers around the Griffin family, Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter Griff ...
'' (episode "
Deep Throats"), and a ''
MADtv
''Mad TV'' (stylized as ''MADtv'') is an American sketch comedy television series originally inspired by '' Mad'' magazine. In its initial run, it aired on Fox from 1995 to 2009. After a one-off reunion show in 2015 to celebrate the twentiet ...
'' sketch in which one of the cars gets fitted with a bomb and explodes after asking questions about the ticking.
See also
*
Cars
A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods.
The year 1886 is regarded as t ...
- A franchise by Pixar featuring anthropomorphic vehicles, with their eyes being on the windows.
References
External links
The Chevron CarsThe Chevron Cars BlogChevron Cars as Branding Identity of Techron Gas
{{Chevron Corporation
Aardman Animations
Automobile advertising characters
Chevron Corporation
Mascots introduced in 1995