Thursday, October 15, 2009

Incredible Toyota Marketing FAIL

As someone who runs into the Marketing organization multiple times a day, this leaves me speechless*:

A Los Angeles woman is suing Toyota for $10 million over a marketing campaign that she claims "punked" her into incorrectly believing she was being stalked.

In a lawsuit filed Sept. 28 in Los Angeles Superior Court, Amber Duick claims she had difficulty eating, sleeping and going to work during March and April of last year after she received e-mails for five days from a fictitious man called Sebastian Bowler, from England, who said he was on the run from the law, knew her and where she lived, and was coming to her home to hide from the police.

Toyota claims that she "opted in" to marketing emails, and so she has no grounds for being terrified. Or something.

Well, people keep looking for ways to come up with more believable marketing campaigns. Looks like Toyota succeeded. Boy, howdy.

My first thought was that the lawsuit had to be part of the marketing campaign - kind of "edgy" to sue yourself, or something. But somehow I don't get the feeling that Judges appreciate thei use of their courtrooms like that. Anyone who's a lawyer, feel free to jump in here.

Hat tip: Slashdot, where the comments give off a distinctly sulfurous air.

* OK, y'all knew I wouldn't be actually speechless.

1 comment:

TOTWTYTR said...

If she wins, maybe Toyota can give her $10Million dollars worth of GM stock. Which at this point should giver her majority control.