Car insurance adds hitting new lows.

mad_machine said:

dean1484 said:

fasted58 said:

I like the Mayhem commercials

not that they would persuade me to buy their insurance tho

Mayhem is great!!!

I look fowards to the mayhem commecials.

Bring back the trunk monkey!

thedoc said:

Wow, timely. I just saw my first USAA ad. My first thought was how much I was paying for it.  Anyone old enough to remember the insurance company from, "The odd couple"?  They had no offices, etc so they could say you money.  No contracts, just a handshake.

Yeah, the only place I've ever really seen USAA advertising is during Army-Navy game or other military-related events (not necessarily on TV). But, USAA continues to send me refund checks every year and have the best rates. Then again, they have a captive market that knows about USAA insurance, and their clientele is (in theory) more responsible than the general public when it comes to not defrauding insurance and driving rates up.

Stupid adds are the main reason I don't watch TV. They are a direct assault on intelligence. Probably why it was called the idiot box when I was growing up. 

In reply to Toyman01 :

Most network stuff now I record and start watching when it’s halfway through.  FF through the bloody commercials.  

In reply to Klayfish :

The Toyota commercials with Jan have my “full” attention.  

Flo is horrendously annoying, and has been for years. They missed the cues that people are sick of an unattractive lady trying to sell an overpriced, under-performing product.   

And yes, I will avoid a company because their adverts are annoying. It’s like the old adage says, you catch more flies with honey. You get more customers with better ads. 

I actually find Flo entertaining because she lives in a crazy fantasy world and they're not afraid to show it.

But I agree - the advertising budgets have to come from somewhere. I go through an independent broker and have insurance from a company that never advertises but has been around for more than a century. Coincidentally, my rates are far lower than those from one of the noisy companies.

Which company is that, Keith?

The one where the mom got insurance with roadside assistance for the teenager who couldn't change a flat tire disappoints me on so many levels. 

DrBoost said:

And yes, I will avoid a company because their adverts are annoying. 

Glad I'm not the only one. Annoying ads, excessive ads, or a combination of the two will make me actively shop at competitors instead whether is for insurance, food, even phone provider. 

Like how I will never donate to Cars 4 Kids because of the goddamed jingle?

Admit it, its in your head right now after reading that.

Appleseed said:

Like how I will never donate to Cars 4 Kids because of the goddamed jingle?

Admit it, its in your head right now after reading that.

It is, and I will never forgive you. Ever.

In reply to irish44j :

Refund checks from USAA? GTFO? For what?  I have had the complete opposite experience with USAA. I don't even know where to start. They have continually raised my home and auto rates with zero tickets, zero claims, and so on and with zero explination. They've threatened to drop some of my vehicles because they've been on "Garage Status" too long. They refused to cover a windshield replacement on one of my cars as well and in Florida that's a freebee. The final straw with them just happened. They raised my home insurance rates by 23% and give me no explination other than "It's a market based rate." 

And in my shopping around for new home and auto, USAA is the most expensive so far. Maybe it's because you're in the NCR; but, elsewhere they are trash IMO. 

USAA also spends a boatload on advertising and they advertise heavily in areas that don't have bases around surprisingly. 

02Pilot said:

Appleseed said:

Like how I will never donate to Cars 4 Kids because of the goddamed jingle?

Admit it, its in your head right now after reading that.

It is, and I will never forgive you. Ever.

I’m fine because I’ve never heard it.  

There is a special place in hell for the Cars 4 Kids jingle people.

spitfirebill said:

02Pilot said:

Appleseed said:

Like how I will never donate to Cars 4 Kids because of the goddamed jingle?

Admit it, its in your head right now after reading that.

It is, and I will never forgive you. Ever.

I’m fine because I’ve never heard it.  

Me neither. I feel like I'm at risk of somebody trying to trick my into hearing it now.

You've been warned.

Appleseed said:

You've been warned.

Like I'm going to click on that. I'll heed your warning.

Appleseed said:

You've been warned.

Nope. Nope. Nope. 

The jingle must not be all that effective. I thought they spelled cars with a K. 

Brett_Murphy said:

Klayfish said:

 But you're really going to pick a product, or not pick one, because you think their TV ads are dumb?

There is a car dealership who put up radio ads that were so incredibly annoying, I've decided to never buy a car from them. 
 

Like the Kia dealership around here whose voice artist's enunciation is so horrible that he makes "month" sound like "line".

I kept trying to figure out what 99 dollars per line had to do with a car, not a phone.

BoostedBrandon said:

I make it a point to carry insurance from companies you don't see advertised on television.

 

They get that advertising budget somewhere, and I don't want it to be me.

Having worked for several insurers in my career I have developed the theory that the more they spend on advertising the more they suck as a company.

My worst experiences as a claim professional were with the big name companies. They tend to be the biggest tightwads using the cheapest parts to proclaim with glee they are the "low cost provider".

I currently work for a large international insurer that does almost no advertising. We operate at a much higher standard than much of the competition and I've been stunned by how many customers tell me our rates are lower than the Lizard, Flo, Mayhem, Statue and Eagle-that-became-a-box-and-then-an-Eagle-again.

Oh, about that last one.

Nationwide for decades had this logo.

Some genius during my tenure with them decided the eagle was too common of a corporate logo. So they hired an ad agency to come up with a new logo. The company orchestrated a company-wide live satellite unveiling of the new logo with every office. They spent millions not just paying the ad agency but replacing all of the signage, stationary, etc to this:

That's right; a giant blue box. They called it a 'picture frame'. You could have heard a pin drop when they dropped the cover off a massive sign version of this logo at the arena in Columbus. We were aghast.

Naturally this moronic logo garnered ZERO market recognition and Nationwide quietly returned to the eagle again in 2014. All while their rates shot up and they've been shedding employees like crazy at my local claim office.

Remember this guy? Scrawling on his white board for UPS?

He's the dude who created the gecko and cave man for GEICO. I could probably retire on what he spends on business lunches.

Pete Gossett said:

I like the supposedly true mishaps in the Farmer’s commercials. 

You can find the accounts of what really happened on their website. The commercials may be over the top and silly, but it appears somebody went through their claims files and pulled out real cases to base this on. As Klayfish noted, many are Claims 101 to an agent, but it does a good job of making basic claims look less boring.

Can we all just agree insurance is a necessary but unnecessary evil? I'm not sure about other states; but,  in Florida you can't even register a vehicle without proof of insurance on that vehicle. If you have insurance on that vehicle and drop it, Florida will find out and then spend tons of taxpayer dollars sending you snail mail to tell you you're wrong and threaten you with fines. I'm not sure how I know but there once was a Chumpcar that had a story like this. 

I'll also take recommendations for replacements for USAA at this time.