Hyundai in Santa Monica

In December I was in the Los Angeles office, when I got the call from Paul Whitney, VP of Pearl Media. "Come to Santa Monica, 3rd Street promenade." My initial question was why, but instead I thought it best to find out for myself. I drove to Santa Monica after locking up the office only to arrive in Santa Monica around 7pm. Once I had parked my car, I knew instantly why he had asked me to show up. From coming off the exit on Lincoln I knew exactly why I was there. A larger than life Hyundai was driving up city hall. When I parked, I could hear the DJ emanating from 3rd street. As I got closer I saw an immense crowd and knew I was getting close. As the beats louder and so did the police presence in the streets, I could see the visual spectacle of a huge 3D projection. Across the street on a rooftop, I could see the DJ and Josh Cohen and Paul Whitney who waved me up for a better view. Which was comical because everywhere was a from row seat. Check out the video.

While I was on the street, I overheard a group of 20 something’s talking about the projection. Graduates from Michigan State, I came to find out. One of them a Zuckerberg look alike stated “Why would Hyundai spend so much on a display like this? Seems like a wasteful use of advertising dollars.” I could not help myself as I introduced myself and jumped into the conversation. After I thanked him for his opinion, I offered a rebuttal thought and explanation. “How much would you pay to make an impression on a person? You may not like this display, right? But that is great, because good or bad it made an impression. You might speak to someone else later and say, I saw this obscene display on 3rd street tonight. In fact, you may show them on your mobile phone the video which was posted to YouTube. And that is worth every penny, to begin the thought which leads to discussion about Hyundai.” His response was that he was not a customer for Hyundai. By this time his friends commented that they thought it was an awesome display regardless of the advertiser. So I had asked the young man if he saw the Lexus projection on the Roosevelt Hotel. He responded with a negative. Which then I asked him if he was a customer for Lexus. He response was, “No, actually the Hyundai was more in his price range and in fact, I know a model that I like the best.” I thanked him and his friends for taking the time to speak with me. Actually another student was from Miami and said that he saw the Art Basel 8 bit art display only a week or two before on Ocean. This was also presented by Pearl Media at the top of the month. WATCH THIS ON YouTube