Volkswagen : For anyone connected in any way with the business of advertising, there probably won't be much argument about our choice of the Volkswagen campaign as the very best of the 60's. Indeed if the 60's were the best of creative times, then the Volkswagen campaign is not merely the best of the 60's, but the best of all time. There are many reasons to believe this. First, the Volkswagen creative strategy was so solid that any number of talented DDB copywriters were able to write brilliantly for the campaign... Volkswagen's irresistible, irreverent and indelible messages appeared in print, on television, on posters, and on the radio with unflagging energy and wit. And the marvel is that they did so year after year without ever appearing tired, shopworn, repetitive -- and without ever wearing out their welcome. The car ran out of gas before the campaign. (Dobrow, Larry. Source : ADS,1984)
Avis : Avis had not been traveling in the fast lane. It was a company with an almost unbroken record of failure and financial losses for nearly 15 years. The entire organization needed repairs and new parts. The first major overhaul occurred in 1962, with the appointment of Robert Townsend as chief executive, This was followed almost immediately by assigning the advertising to Doyle Dane Bernbach....In 1963 - almost overnight - Avis raced into the black, propelled by advertising. In some ways the Avis campaign was an even more daring breakthrough than the advertising DDB was doing for Volkswagen. Nobody could recall any other advertising like it. Imagine a company actually admitting it was only number two in its industry. Research indicated that the campaign should not run, and if it did, it would fail. So much for research, at least as practiced in the 60's. But there was more to the Avis creative strategy than a catch headline. The ads appealed to every struggling underdog (that's most of us) to strike a financial blow against smug, swaggering top dog.... (Dobrow, Larry. Source : ADS,1984)