Hey! I am a thumper, and I (well, my wife and I) have purchased 5 new vehicles in the last 14. :p

Sorry, an image of 'Bambi' just flashed through my head for a second.
:D

Uh... it was my understanding there would be no math. ;)

But since you asked for math, here's some.

The following is a hypothetical situation. I do not know the actual demographics for car-buying purchases (dammit, if I were still working at my old job, I could have told you) involved in this situation, I am merely suggesting a possible scenario.

If there are at least 4.7 times as many Bible-Thumping-Rednecks who purchase new vehicles every 23 years as there are Limp-Wristed-Homos [I figured I could be equally insulting] who buy new vehicles every 5 years, then the Thumpers have greater buying clout.

So do the Thumpers outnumber us 'Mos five to one? As a nation, possibly. Do they outnumber us in the Bible Belt! Almost certainly. Does Ford need to be concerned for their dealers located in those wretched regions? From a business standpoint, I think they do.

Look, I'd love it if Ford would tell the AFA to go fück themselves. (Hell, I'd love it if the AFA and their moronic brethren all drank grape Kool-Aid in Guyana!) But with the financial instability so prevalent in the automotive industry right now, I can hardly blame Ford for trying to appeal to the widest number of people possible. I think they went about it the wrong way, but I can understand their motivations.

And, if I understand things correctly, it all ended up well anyway. Ford will (correct me if I'm wrong) continue to advertise in gay publications, The Advocate will thus have no basis on which to sue, and the ads will merely be targeted to gays as if they were ordinary people motivated by vehicle needs rather than sexual partner preferences.

I think I rather like the way this turned out. (The ends, though certainly not the means.)

I'm late into this thread, but caught this article yesterday...
http://www.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/12/....ap/index.html

Think maybe Ford will switch sides again? ;)

Maybe Ford should stop meeting with special interest groups and let their marketing department do their job.

Ya think???

Got a few of these responses this week from Ford, LR, Jag etc.

Let me paraphrase for you:

Dear Brad,

Blah Blah Blah. Yaddah yaddah yaddah.

Sincerely,
Colleen Hogan
Jaguar Cars

:D

-----------------

Dear Mr. Brad XXXXXXXX,

Thank you for contacting Jaguar Cars. We were sorry to learn of your
dissatisfaction regarding our projected advertising plans.

At Jaguar we will, as we have said previously, shift our marketing to
the GLBT community from more mass above-the-line communications, to a
more focused below-the line approach. We believe it will provide a
stronger and more effective platform to showcase and demonstrate our
vehicles. The change in emphasis reflects the development of new brand
campaigns and an accompanying sharpening of our media focus. These
decisions were taken entirely for business reasons. We fully understand
the concerns that were raised, and regret the way in which the plans
were unfortunately characterized.

We want to reaffirm that Jaguar values diversity among all of our
constituents and pride ourselves on strong and clear values -respect for
our customers, communities, employees, suppliers and dealers; acceptance
of our differences; inclusion of different people with different
perspectives; and integrity to always do the right thing. We value all
people - regardless of their race, religion, gender, sexual orientation
and cultural or physical differences. This is a strong commitment we
intend to carry forward with no exception.

We can only hope that, perhaps in the future, you will give us a chance
to restore your confidence in Jaguar.


Sincerely,


Colleen Hogan
Jaguar Cars

These cats just did a study on Coors. Wonder if there's anything in their tome about Ford?