1980s Esprit advertising by Lotus Cars USA

[WayneB]

Found these whilst looking through some old Motor Trend, Car and Driver and Road and Track magazines from the 80s.

Edited January 1, 2007 by WayneB

[esprit350]

Thanks Wayne, some good tag lines, especially the first one...

[Kimbers]

Best one was the last which my old man has up on his wall "For the few who know the difference" I like that.

[MKE40]

Best one was the last which my old man has up on his wall "For the few who know the difference" I like that.

AND THERE, ............ lies the problem...........

No doubt the CEO will agree, 'Does not matter how good the product is ...if the proles dont' make up the sales figures ( Like on Elise / Europa ) everything is for nothing, you can forget beautifully designed and executed flagships. !

Mike

[Paul C]

Anyone got a copy of the 'all work and no play makes jack a dull boy' Esprit

ad from the 90's? I thought this was a good ad, even though it was an S4 and

not an SE.

[Dan]

Wayne - great adverts, thanks for scanning those in for us, I really enjoyed reading through them. Seems so much more convincing than the 'lifestyle positioning' rubbish that motor manufacturers insist on these days

Can I just be a pedant and point out that the red car on the advert for the Lotus Esprit Turbo appears to be badged as a normally apsirated Esprit?

Other contemporary material shows that the US turbo got the same badging as the UK models...

I'll get me coat now...

[Kimbers]

AND THERE, ............ lies the problem...........

No doubt the CEO will agree, 'Does not matter how good the product is ...if the proles dont' make up the sales figures ( Like on Elise / Europa ) everything is for nothing, you can forget beautifully designed and executed flagships. !

Mike

Ah yes but the beauty of it is "For the few who know the difference" gets people thinking "hmmm they must know more than me"....or...."I'll test drive it to see if i can see what the difference is" It's a Grass is greener on the other side sales technique, it worked really well at the time.

[WayneB]

Can I just be a pedant and point out that the red car on the advert for the Lotus Esprit Turbo appears to be badged as a normally apsirated Esprit?

Dan, I have only ever seen the Stevens Turbos over here with the Esprit badge on the rear side windows.

Heres a picture of one my friend Paul Gardi currently has for sale at www.gardellimotors.ca in London Ontario.

Its all original.

Heres the one on the cover of Car and Driver magazine June 1988 (I will post the full article later)

Edited January 2, 2007 by WayneB

[Paul C]

More and more Stevens pictures from Wayne!!!

Methinks the man might be coming round to the jelly side after all...

[Mark Blanchard]

Thanks for those. I've been looking for that US Stevens ad for some time. They're super rare over here.

The magazine I

[chandrab]

Can we get some of these scans in higher resolution? I'd love to hang them up on my wall!

The first ad...with the White '83 Esprit, I saw first as a teenager in math class and I stared in amazement.

From that moment I knew I had to have an Esprit.

-Chandra

91SE

[Dan]

Dan, I have only ever seen the Stevens Turbos over here with the Esprit badge on the rear side windows.

Thanks Wayne - I stand corrected I did think it unlikely that I was right, but I do struggle to control my inner pedant at times. These bloody pedants are such fast typists, you see

I do like those grey sills... never totally understood why that colour scheme was chosen, but it always reminds me in a very positive way of my first excited love/hate reactions on seeing the restyled Esprit... and no I'm not trolling for a G vs. S debate!

[dodgy]

Can we get some of these scans in higher resolution? I'd love to hang them up on my wall!

The first ad...with the White '83 Esprit, I saw first as a teenager in math class and I stared in amazement.

From that moment I knew I had to have an Esprit.

-Chandra

91SE

[USAndretti42]

Love the "Mass production" advert. It's right. There's certainly a lot of Corvettes and Porsches around. ( Having said that, at work we have 2 Corvette owners, 2 Porsche owners and 3 Lotus owners, a Seven, and Exige and my Esprit. )