Chrysler Cirrus Ad - Juan Roberts

This image was the first time that a practically bald Black woman had ever been featured in an automotive ad. When I originally presented this to my client at DaimlerChrysler, there was an audible gasp heard in the room ... then chatter all around.

At that time during my GlobalHue years, the client group consisted of a multicultural female driven client team. Our assignment was always to develop marketing communications that reached African Americans with a certain panache. That way our afrocentric work would complement the general market ad messages.

I developed this ad with the clear purpose to subliminally suggest the continent of Africa. The Ad line was, "Think of this as one of the more forward ideas on the planet." To the socially conscious I was dropping hints all over the place -- Africa, Black woman as mother Earth, defining African American culture as being a part of the future of this nation's economy, etc.

I've done tons of automotive introductions (Intrepid, PT Cruiser, Cirrus, Neon, Durango, Liberty), this one was special. So, once we had the concept sold, which took about 2 weeks, production took over. I oversaw each step from the shooter to casting, make-up to wardrobe. After about 200 hundred women, this actress walked in with short cropped hair, her face was amazing and when I saw her profile, I was done. The shape of her head, lips, eyes, the composition of her brow and cheekbones, the gentle hook in back of her head ... all perfect. We even paid her a special fee to cut her hair this short and then got to work.

We shot in Hollywood, with the world famous Bobby Holland. He pulled out the stops and booked us at the Reid Miles Studio of the renowned Blue Note music label. It was a full day shoot, beginning with breakfast on set. Their was full glam squad of completely talented, high-performance women. We went through a myriad of wardrobe choices, but nothing hit me with the purity you see in the final ad. No earrings, no necklaces, no hint of dilution of her oneness with her being ... wow! This is a powerful shot [if I do say so myself]. There is very little retouching either. I only had to touch up the holes in her ear, because girlfriend walked in with at least 10 earrings in her right ear alone.

This was page two of the ad. I could have just done the big splashy thing and run the two pages side-by-side like most ads, but that would have taken some of the love from the first page. The strategy was to insert the two pages in magazines as two consecutive right-side pages. A little bit about the second page.

This beauty shot was achieved in the El Mirage dry lake bed of the Mojave desert by the Ace Creative Director, Damon Davis. He shot with Bobby, who brilliantly added Musco® Lightning to a open desert location that provided us with this amazing other-worldly kinda shot that is like none other. They shot just after the sun ducked beneath the horizon. Having only 30 minutes to capture this gorgeous shot before complete desert darkness was a virtual miracle.

We reprised the text from page one to accentuate the vehicle. The outcome was magical. We had a strong first page that merged and defined the Chrysler brand with African Americans and then the second page sold the car as purely as it should -- in hero lighting. I used no further advertising text, just listed the vehicle features and brand nomenclature. It was a wrap.