Bruce Springsteen starred and narrated a two-minute Super Bowl ad for Jeep, which featured a lot more Americana and scenery than any other vehicle.
Rob DeMartin for Jeep
The Jeep Super Bowl commercial starring Bruce Springsteen was a decade in the works, according to Olivier Francois, an automotive marketing executive who rose to fame for convincing A-list celebrities to appear in such ads.
Every year since 2011, Francois has said he pitched an idea for a Super Bowl commercial to Springsteen’s manager, Jon Landau. It became somewhat of a tradition, although Francois thought there was little or no chance of it happening.
Why Springsteen, who had never appeared in a commercial before? It dates back to the automaker’s former CEO, Sergio Marchionne, who died unexpectedly in 2018. The Italian-Canadian businessman was a fan of the singer and used his music regularly at presentations and events, linking Springsteen’s persona to the company.
“What you see today is really a story of 10 years in the making,” Francois told CNBC. “We started discussing Bruce – about Bruce, not him, about – with my old boss, Sergio … He loved Bruce Springsteen’s music.”
Francois, chief marketing officer of Jeep’s parent company, Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler), has convinced Detroit rapper Eminem and musician Bob Dylan to star in the company’s ads. He even voiced Oprah Winfrey once. Last year, Francois convinced elusive actor Bill Murray to reprise his role from the 1993 film “Groundhog Day” for a Super Bowl ad.
He said it was his “biggest regret” that he couldn’t get the Springsteen commercial to take place while Marchionne was still alive. “My biggest regret today is that they never got to meet. I always promised him that I would make something happen and I delivered a little too late,” said Francois.
Why now?
Francois first pitched Springsteen on a 2012 Super Bowl commercial called “It’s Halftime in America” which starred actor Clint Eastwood, another celebrity not known for appearing in advertisements or attaching himself to a product or company. . In the ad, Eastwood was the country’s coach, urging the US to learn from Detroit’s auto industry revival.
Francois called this year’s ad a “ successor ” to that commercial, as well as others, like a 2013 Super Bowl spot called “ Farmer. ” Both were cinematic, pro-country ads with few actual vehicles.
In this year’s “The Middle” commercial, Springsteen drives around in an old jeep and talks about a chapel in the middle of the country called US Center Chapel in Lebanon, Kansas. He used the extremely small chapel as a base to talk about the country that needed to meet ‘here, in the middle’ before the ad ended with ‘To the ReUnited States of America’. This was followed by a website and logos for Jeep, which will be celebrating its 80th anniversary in 2021.
Bruce Springsteen (left) with Olivier Francois, Stellantis chief marketing officer, during the filming of the company’s Super Bowl LV ad for the company’s Jeep.
Rob DeMartin for Jeep
In a press release, Landau said as soon as they saw the field, they decided it was something they had to do.
“Olivier Francois and I have been discussing ideas for the past 10 years and when he showed us the outline of ‘The Middle’ our immediate response was ‘Let’s do it’,” he said. “Our goal was to do something surprising, relevant, immediate and artful. I believe Bruce did that with ‘The Middle’.”
Francois believes the ad’s message was in line with Springsteen’s beliefs and struck the “right balance” between the company’s goal and that of the singer, who narrated an ad campaign for Joe Biden last year.
Francois said Springsteen was heavily involved in the creation of the Jeep ad and worked closely with director Thom Zimny. He wrote and produced the original score for the commercial with another of his frequent collaborators, Ron Aniello.
The ad almost didn’t get through
According to Francois, the commercial with Springsteen almost never came about. After being rejected by the singer’s manager for 10 years, he had decided not to pitch an idea for Springsteen to Landau.
“I think this is the first year I haven’t asked an agency to try and crack a Bruce Springsteen idea,” he said. “I think it took me ten years to understand that it never happens. Obviously I was mistaken, but I thought so. And it was also misuse of John Landau and Bruce’s time.”
Bruce Springsteen starred and narrated a two-minute Super Bowl ad for Jeep, which featured a lot more Americana and scenery than any other vehicle.
Rob DeMartin for Jeep
That is until Southfield, Michigan-based ad agency Doner put forward the idea of ’The Middle’. After reaching out to Landau in early January to say Happy New Year, Francois decided to send the ad agency’s pitch to him. Francois said that when Landau received the field, it believed it was “the right message.”
“Yes, he’s taking a stand, but he’s taking a stand for the center,” Francois said. “It’s not liberal. It’s not Republican. It’s just something trying to stand up for the non-political. The common ground.”
The message seems to have caught on with viewers. Since the ad was published on YouTube early Sunday morning, it has been viewed approximately 24 million times. That’s about four times more than the combined viewership of other auto Super Bowl ads from General Motors, Toyota Motor, and online car salesman Vroom.