Pontiacs Scores Major Marketing Coup by Providing New G6s
It pays to be in the right place at the right time, or at least that must be how 276 Oprah Winfrey fans feel right about now.
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| Talk show host Oprah Winfrey (center) poses atop a Pontiac G6 outside her Harpo studios in Chicago, Illinois, September 9, 2004, surrounded by some of the 276 delighted fans that made up the audience of her first show of the season. Each received a key to a new G6 during the show's taping. (Photo: Bob Davis, Harpo Productions) |
Talk about fan appreciation day, those in attendance of her season-opening show on Monday got a big surprise as they went home with the keys to a new Pontiac G6. That's one per attendee, a 276 tally that in total is worth $7.7 million USD.
Everyone knows that Oprah is rich, after enjoying 18 years with "The Oprah Winfrey Show" at the top of television daytime talk shows, but spending close to eight million would have been a little bit too generous if she had actually paid the tab herself. Instead General Motors footed the bill, and it might be one of the best publicity stunts in recent memory, being that the show airs in 212 U.S. markets plus 109 additional markets, many of which are Canadian.
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| Oprah Winfrey (left) is introduced to General Motors Orion Assembly Center employee Carol Vance (right) by Plant Manager Jamie Hresko Thursday, September 2, 2004. Winfrey visited the plant, which builds the G6 model she gave away on her show, for a tour earlier this month. (Photo: Tom Pidgeon, General Motors of Canada) |
Monday's Pontiac G6 giveaway was kicked off this season's "Wildest Dreams Come True" theme, a feel-good segment of the show where Oprah connects needy recipients that have unfulfilled wishes with those than can fulfill them.
"It's incalculable," commented Mark-Hans Richter, Pontiac's director of marketing. "The power of this is not in how many minutes of airtime we received. It's the power of Oprah. The buzz and validity is priceless, especially among women. There will be a lot of women talking about the G6 tonight over dinner."