The Lexus Golden Opportunity Sales Event

Lexus ads don't stick out in my memory as particularly bothersome.

They also don't stick out as particularly genius.

Their marketing may have turned a corner. Recently I've had the pleasure of the spots trumpeting their "Golden Opportunity Sales Event" promotion. Each spot features an unlikely person proposing an even unlikelier business opportunity to a potential investor.

One spot seems to depict Las Vegas "founder" Bugsy Siegel, pitching the idea of swimming pools, resorts, and drive-up wedding chapels to another mob boss in the middle of a sandy desert. Another may portray Federal Express founder and then-Yale undergrad Frederick W. Smith, who proposes an overnight package shipping service to his professor. The last features Will Keith Kellogg, delicately presenting his "corn-flakes" to a board of suits.

Of course, all of these ideas are shot down, at which point Lexus swoops in and makes their point about not missing golden opportunities. This little campaign epitomizes what I look for in good advertising. Quick, simple, effective. It's a language, you know? Eloquence and persuasiveness go much further than brutish diction and unsupported assertions.