Ford's new campaign for F-150 Lightning spotlights individual workers building the all-electric ... [+]
Ford marketers were excited to land exclusive automotive sponsorship of the Kentucky Derby three years ago, in an era of dwindling opportunities to make major impressions on viewers with marketing during a massively attended, live-TV event. Then Covid hit in March, 2020, delaying the race to September. And last year, the Derby faced reduced in-person attendance and scandalously saw eventual disqualification of the winning horse after a drug test.
Sprint ahead to this year: Ford is in the third year of its relationship with the star-crossed Derby and finally able to deploy the kind of all-out effort the company has been hoping to display in concert with the event. When the gates lift and 20 thoroughbreds sprint out at about 7 p.m. Eastern time on Saturday at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ford executives expect to be in the midst of a broad and well-orchestrated campaign that takes full advantage of its sponsorship.
“When we knew we were going to have this sponsorship, we wanted to look at it differently and extend it differently,” Jim Peters, Ford’s head of U.S. sponsorships and partnerships, told me. “This is the first year it’s happening in a unique way, because of what Covid did, and it’s an exciting time to celebrate.”
Even in just the last couple of years since Ford’s sponsorship began, Peters said, “there have been lots of innovations in the sponsorship business, including a lot of virtual events and activations. But something like the Derby is a hard thing to recreate.”
So, for one thing, Ford plans to use NBC’s broadcast of the Derby to launch its new TV and online advertising campaign for the F-150 Lightning all-electric pickup truck, arguably the company’s most exciting and even provocative new model in decades. The Lightning campaign is using a traditional approach featuring themes of employee toil and teamwork in an anthem-style TV commercial, but Ford also is deploying a lot of resources online to promote specific features of the vehicle, especially its on-board generator and its under-the-hood spacious “frunk,”
Developed by Wieden + Kennedy, the campaign features spots that are narrated by Bryan Cranston, the actor who’s been the voice of Ford commercials for a few years now, and features employees assembling Lightning at the company’s new Rouge Electric Vehicle Center in Dearborn, Michigan.
At the same time, the cutting edge of Ford marketing also will be on display in the Derby sponsorship. For example, during the TV broadcast, NBC will focus on individual Ford employees in what is being called a Very Important Builders area at Churchill Downs, with front-row seats at the first turn. These workers might be considered organic to the crowd because Ford builds big SUVs and heavy-duty pickups at a plant in Louisville.
“We’re going to do a cool integration with the NBC team, and it will feel like part of the broadcast,” Peters said. “It will celebrate what ‘Builders’ is all about, spotlighting the names” of some Ford workers as in its new ads for Lightning. “Usually the people spotlighted in the crowd are celebrities, and the talk is about fashion. This is not usually the type of thing people would be called out for [in Derby coverage], but we’re going to.”
Ford also is getting a head start on the telecast by launching some content about Lightning and “Builders” on TikTok. “Broadcast is very important, but the really great opportunity to amplify the campaign is in social media,” Peters said. “That’s where all of the buzz goes on. With an event like the Kentucky Derby, you’ll get a certain number of people watching it for the race, but there will be buzz around pre- and post-race coverage. We’re working that social angle this year.”
