Car Insurance: "Mayhem" Means Money!

I don’t think the average American can go through the day without being exposed to some kind of ad for car insurance.

There must be a lot of money to be made since it seems the airwaves are littered with commercials. I think the first big player was GEICO. It was their “good news” campaign, where the answer to the “I’ve got good news!” statement was: “I just saved $400 on car insurance by switching to GEICO!” It was so effective that most of us used it as a punch line in everyday life.

That’s effective.

GEICO was not content to stay there. Along came the Caveman-those ads can still be seen, but the real star of the GEICO show is the gecko. That little green dude is everywhere. And even though the lizard shares time with another campaign that links mini-vignettes of woodchucks chucking wood and Abe Lincoln being painfully honest, the gecko still reigns supreme.

Of course, there’s the slightly wacko lady selling Progressive Car Insurance in a blindingly white store and others from State Farm and Farmers—and on and on.

My absolute favorite though, is Allstate Insurance—starring actor Dean Winters as the character “Mayhem”. Known for his roles in HBO’s “Oz” and NBC’s “30 Rock”, his greatest exposure has to be in ads for Allstate.

Here’s a compilation of these hilarious commercials—some of which I had never seen—and what I believe is a new one:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7R8vG9NJQFY


This one I came across while researching this blog—“Mayhem” as a GPS-enjoy:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZXM_g3mqew&NR=1

After all these spots, I still don’t know which car insurance is the cheapest—or which one is the best, but based solely on their marketing, I rate Allstate #1 and GEICO a close #2!

If you’d like my blog in your box, just let me know: tim.moore@citcomm.com