I have been shopping around for a car, and one thing I have noticed is that Subaru dealerships often have employee’s dogs in them. Some of them even put pictures of the dogs in the brochures. No other brand seems to have dogs in the dealership. Anybody know what this is about? Is this something Subaru asked their dealers to do?
I think it’s a corporate program. Remember that the advertising tagline is “Love. It’s what makes a Subaru a Subaru.” And they have a “Subaru Pet Hall of Fame.” Presumably they think it helps them appeal to the right sort of customers.
Also Subaru is well aware that for their customer demographic gay women are a VERY loyal cohort of Subaru vehicle purchasers and a good proportion of gay women are VERY animal centric and love their doggies like kids. It also ties in nicely with the husband-wife-dog young family demographic they target.
It’s genius marketing.
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Dogs go with the outdoorsy image Subaru tries to promote. IIRC the dogs are usually goldens or some other large-ish friendly dog with outdoor sporting cred.
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Subaru marketing relies heavily on emotional appeal, and big friendly dogs are really great for promoting that in the target customer. As Dewey Finn noted above, their slogan is “Love. It’s what makes a Subaru a Subaru.” Subaru isn’t trying to sell you a car. They’re trying to turn you into a “Subaru Person” who will keep on buying Subarus for decades to come. Subaru people may even feel friendlier towards other Subaru owners because they assume they have some fundamental common values.
- Subaru Person since '93
I love their doggy commercials! My wife and I have had Subarus since '81 and always from one to three dogs all the while.
I think its like a ski or snowboarding outfit. It seems they always have a dog at those places.
Dogs have a calming effect with people and kids love them.
You can also shoehorn two Greyhounds into a 1993 Impreza hatchback if you fold the rear seat down.
Sadly, I’ve never seen a dog at the two Subaru dealerships that I’ve used.
When I was doing rescue transport, I once transported 8 dogs, in crates, in my 2008 Outback.
Our local dealership is always doing promotions with the municipal shelter I volunteer at. A couple weeks ago they sponsored the adoption fees for all the dogs adopted over the weekend that were already spayed/neutered.
I don’t think I ever paid attention to Subaru’s commercials before I bought mine and I definitely had no knowledge of the lesbian connection. Now I see the doggie commercials and it just makes me proud. Also, I get a lot of attention from strangers admiring it, but it’s both men and women so I don’t know if that has any bearing. Also, also, you couldn’t get much more than a chihuahua in my car.
My husband and I recently bought a Subaru and we joked with the salesman that it should have come with a complimentary dog. Subarus and dogs are ubiquitous in the Rocky Mountain area.
All of the above is true, but Subarus being the default dog-haulers predates their current luvy-duvy marketing strategy. I think it’s mostly that Subaru locked-in the dog owner market because they were the only company that kept making station wagons in any great numbers through the 90’s and 2000’s. During the period after the station wagon’s demise and the rise of today’s station-wagon-in-all-but-name CUV’s your only other options were gas guzzling SUV’s or a hatchback that wouldn’t leave much room for Fido.
Of course it also just plays in to the whole outdoors-y image too. I’m just waiting for some car company to woo us cat owners: “Hey, you didn’t want to leave the house anyways!”
I don’t need a new car, but now I want to go shopping for a Subaru, just to make some new canine friends.
Wow*!* I’ve never owned one but I just took my dad to drop his off for service at the Subaru dealership and sure enough there was a dog walking around in the large showroom/waiting room. I thought it was a little odd. I even asked the service guy if he knew*!*
It’s just the Outback and Forester. E.g. WRX owners are all (ALL) 20-something men.
It seems to me that no matter who owns it, an Outback/Forester (especially the former) has to have some shit on their root. Ski rack, bikes, extra storage, whatever.
I always thought it was because Subarus were all wheel drive.
Well, AWD is a big part of why Subaru was able to keep making station wagons because it let them market those AWD wagons as alternatives to SUV’s. It’s interesting that back in the 90’s everyone used outdoors-y marketing to sell SUV’s but Subaru managed to avoid the environmental taint SUV’s got and a lot of their marketing these days wouldn’t be too out of place selling Ford Explorers circa 1998.
I’m 35 and have one (purchased at age 33), but I guess I’m a bit immature, if that helps.