As cuddly the video presented by Renault in Europe is, as nasty is the one presented by Nissan in the US. There, in a place where a company is free to advertise its products by making fun of the competition's Nissan's Leaf jumped right at the throat of Chevrolet's Volt, making it look small, insignificant and, above all, it made it look just as ordinary as everything else.
Nissan's campaign was not left unanswered by GM, the giant that decided not to build electric vehicles, but plug-in hybrids. Meaning cars that still use an internal combustion engine (hence the memorable image with the “electric” Volt gassing up at a station somewhere), even if it's called “range extender.”
In a rare, but delicious unofficial reply on Twitter, GM product and brand communications chief Jason Laird had this to say:
“A carmaker poking gentle fun at our product ignores towtrucks they need and rental cars they recommend as backup to their product.”
On the other hand, Rob Peterson, the go-to guy for Volt PR, liked the commercial. He calls it cute, but then he remembers he works for GM and adds that the video is "misleading and damaging to the EV movement."
More to follow, in this new battle between Leaf and Volt, we're sure.
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