Question of the Week: What’s the Best Lexus Marketing Slogan?

One of my favorite marketing slogans of all time is “When it rains, it pours.” While it sounds like–and is often used as–a colloquialism to describe hard times, it was actually thought up to sell salt. Yup, no joke. From the official Morton Salt page: 

“In 1911, Morton created free-flowing salt by adding magnesium carbonate as an absorbing element. Following that, Morton decided to run a series of ads in Good Housekeeping magazine promoting its new product. An ad was developed featuring the little girl carrying the round container and holding an umbrella during a rain shower. The original copy read, “Even in rainy weather, it flows freely.” Everyone agreed on the ad’s appeal, but thought the copy was too wordy. It was reworded and a new advertising slogan was born!”

Now, no modern car company will come up with something with the staying power of that simple, brilliant, phrase, that’s not going to stop the Don Drapers of the world from trying. And there are plenty of good ones! Mercedes has “The best or nothing,” Porsche has “There is no substitute,” and Cadillac has “the Standard of the World.” Ferrari doesn’t have a slogan, which is probably a good thing, given how awful corporate cousin Maserati’s–“The Absolute Opposite of Ordinary”–is, Modena should probably keep it that way.

But what about Lexus? Personally, I think the company hit it out of the park on the first pitch–“The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection.” There have been others over the years–including “The Passionate Pursuit of Perfection” variant–and the “Engineering the Impossible” theme of advertisements, which I never cared for. To quote Lou Reed, “Impossible doesn’t mean very difficult. Very difficult is winning the Nobel Prize; impossible is eating the Sun.”

Given Lexus’ aggressive design language and the burly product coming down the pipe, I think “relentless” is still perfect.