offered the fair sex a pink purse included in the car's purchase and a custom-made storage place.;Quick change: Ford in the 1950s showed Ann Hart, ``weighing in at 98 lbs.'' (l.) easily handling a car that far outweighed her. But just 10 years later Ford

For almost a century, automakers have hotly pursued the female buyer through a route sometimes marked by potholes and fraught with wrong turns. The industry has zeroed in on women using pitches from fear to fashion-and just about everything in between-to win the nod from women. Automakers have learned much along the way. As far back as the early 1900s, most major automakers recognized the power of the female in influencing a car purchase. Most of these efforts showed women at the wheel to demonstrate the ease of driving the car. A typical 1907 ad from the H.H. Franklin Mfg. Co., for example, shows a woman in long skirts and full driving regalia bent determinedly over the wheel, with the caption, "Notice how much room there is to get in or out of the driver's side." A POTENT FACTOR By the end of the next decade, Ford had advanced a step further. An effort circa 1929 quotes a woman saying, "If I want to take my little boy to the dentist or doctor, it is always nice to know that there is a car on the place in emergencies...without it, home would seem almost a prison." By the late 1930s, auto marketers were actively studying the influence of the fair sex on car purchases. Chrysler Corp. and its agency at that time, the Lee Anderson Advertising Co., found women a "potent factor" in 75% of all new auto purchases. To tap into this, Chrysler ran a local ad and promotional campaign in 15 major cities tying in with department stores with a fashion theme. The copy, slanted locally and geared specifically to women, was credited with raising Chrysler car sales 33%. Although the pitch showed women in the newest clothing styles, the copy reflected Chrysler's findings that women liked to read simplistic mechanical details in ads. "Chrysler has a new rhythm this year, which they tell me is born of Superfinished parts," says a woman in an ad aimed at Chicagoans. "Pistons and bearings and things so smooth that their surfaces are measured in millionths of an inch!" ROSIE THE RIVETER With World War II, women emerged independent and determined in the war effort; images of Rosie the Riveter prevailed. Detroit changed tactics, too, taking a more scientific approach to reaching women. By 1948, Ford, Plymouth, Cadillac, Oldsmobile, Chevrolet and Kaiser-Frazer all were actively buying space in women's magazines such as Women's Home Companion. A Ford spot from the mid-1950s era starts out with a woman identified as Ann Hart, weighing in at 98 lbs., squaring off against a 3,600 lb. ("a ton and a half!" the spot proclaims) Ford. But thanks to "Master Guide Power Steering," Ms. Hart "easily makes the car do what she wants it to do," the commercial says. Engineers in the '40s also were trying to discover what makes women comfortable in a car with the help of "Squirming Irma," a "well-shaped contraption," said Advertising Age at the time, that approximated a 130-lb. woman and gave "11 complete squirms a minute to test fabric wear and construction" of a car's seats. FASHION FLAIR In the 1950s, automakers decided to go to the source to find out what women wanted in a car. A luncheon for women drivers sponsored by the Hudson Motors division of American Motors Corp. in 1955 found out this important information about what was essential in a car: A roof high enough that the feather in a woman's hat doesn't get crushed, a close brake pedal and a block on the floor to accommodate high heels. Mary Davis Gilles, house and home fashion editor of McCall's, was pointed in her assessment to the National Association of Automobile Dealers of what automakers were doing wrong. "Keep color discussion on an emotional basis," she urged the group in a speech that same year, "and use color names which generate pleasing pictures-nugget gold, mimosa yellow, champagne beige and burgundy red." Chrysler also got into the act, marketing the Dodge LaFemme in the 1950s, a pink auto trimmed with pastel rose tapestry that came complete with a matching parasol, purse, rain cape and, as Chrysler promotional materials described them, "dainty rain boots for unexpected showers." The advertising called LaFemme "the first and only car designed for Your Majesty, the modern American woman." In 1960, Chevrolet began promoting dresses color-coordinated to match their cars. The cross-promotion with Smoler Bros., a dressmaker, offered Smoler six of Chevy's patented colors for a line sold in 5,500 dress and specialty shops nationwide. COLOR COORDINATED Chevrolet then pitched the dresses in conjunction with major department stores, putting mannequins in the flouncy frocks beside cars in their store windows. Ads in local papers supported the $65,000 promotion and the make awarded a new car to the woman giving the best reason for liking her new Chevrolet-color clothes. "There was a lot of pandering," recalls McCann-Erickson Worldwide Vice-Chairman North America Sean Fitzpatrick of these early auto ads. "There were the worst stereotypes you can ever possibly imagine," says Robert Austin, director of marketing communications, Volvo Cars of North America. The fact that women's liberation was a decade away was apparent in the early 1960s spot for Buick Riviera, described as "A rare machine that a woman can admire and enjoy to the fullest but only a man can understand." SHIFTING GEARS In 1965, Volkswagen of America decided to introduce an automatic-transmission-equipped Beetle and Karmann Ghia to reach females who, presumably, disdained stick shifts. "You can drive it like a shiftless car, or if you like, you can still shift gears," said Michael Genert, ad manager at the time. "And if your wife hates shift driving and you like shift driving, the solution is there, in one car." Advertising also shifted into second as the freewheeling '60s hit full swing. Automakers' pitches to women evolved into a curious mixture of sexual liberation and sexual objects. HOOD ORNAMENTS Women became hood ornaments: Joan Parker, the "Dodge Fever" girl, developed a trademark look of a tight blouse and white Stetson hat; Dodge's "Rebellion" campaign also featured sexy women. A circa 1965 Ford LTD commercial shows a woman escaping from a rainstorm in the car, pouting for the camera and draping herself seductively over the upholstery as the voice-over describes the car's luxurious features. But car advertising was also a product of the liberated '60s. An example is J. Walter Thompson Co.'s campaign for the Ford Mustang. The talk of the ad world at the time was the agency's "Walter Mitty" commercial (its actual name was "Henry Foster"), which showed a normally uptight antiques dealer passing up luncheon at a teahouse with old biddies to escape in his Mustang to an assignation with a beautiful woman. While the "Mitty" ad is still famous to this day, there is a lesser recalled-and perhaps even better-creative execution for female viewers, called "Emily." The spot features a pince-nez clad, efficiently dull secretary transformed into a brightly dressed, "mod" young woman when she jumps in her Mustang, drives to the airport and skydives out of a plane. In actuality, women still had a way to go in their quest for equality in the world of advertising. When the Mary Wells-founded Wells, Rich, Greene agency won the $12 million AMC account in 1967, Ad Age's story began: "What? Let a woman handle an automotive account? Absolutely unheard of. Contrary to every tradition held sacred in Detroit since the first Henry Ford." In the same article, veteran adman Carl Ally commented: "All I know is she's a girl and it's a car." FEMALE CHAUVINISM It wasn't easy for a woman to work at a car agency at the time. Longtime JWT copywriter Victor Kenyon, now retired, recalls pitching Ford in the 1970s an ad concept actually penned by a woman because "we didn't think it'd go over" if presented by a female. Mr. Fitzpatrick has similar memories, but adds that some of the worst offenders in writing copy that talked down to women were women. "They wrote male-chauvinist-pig stuff," he says. "It was far worse than what the men did. It was a hard mindset to break." Part of the reason, he thinks, is because Detroit was behind the times. "When I came to Detroit in 1983, it was like you'd expect to see Ozzie and Harriet any second. The men wore cardigans and the women baked cookies." While advertising had made strides with a more equalized balance in reaching women, a 1967 print effort from McCann-Erickson made it seem as if there were little progress being made. Themed "Any woman who can cook a seafood mousse can understand a tuned car," the ad read in part: "Just because tuning is so dear to our hearts, is that any sign it's too technical for you? No indeed. Tuning a car, you see, isn't all that much different from cooking up a special dish..." It ends with a recipe for seafood mousse and the words: "If you still don't understand the inner workings of a tuned car, remember this. Your husband probably couldn't make a seafood mousse to save his soul." '70s, '80s AND BEYOND Detroit's love affair with women has indeed changed. In 1975, Cadillac used the fashion standard to sell its Seville, with ads using models in designer dresses, including fashion shows at dealer showrooms. Today, however, to introduce its new Catera, a model with high appeal to women, Cadillac has assembled a group of women to market the car and has gone so far as to have men working on the brand wear paper clips on their fingers to approximate what it feels like to have long nails when operating the car. Ford took a practical approach toward women in 1980, introducing a booklet written by Ann and Charlotte Ford, daughters of Henry Ford II, offering advice to women drivers, traveling tips and motoring etiquette. In 1978, Chrysler formed the Women's Advisory Committee on the Automotive Market, a 30-member group of women from the company in all disciplines from finance to marketing. The group has recommended improvements such as driver-side sliding doors on 1996 minivans, integrated child seats and adjustable webbing material in shoulder harnesses, according to Theresa Klix, a program analyst and co-chairman of the Chrysler committee. Detroit seems to have finally struck a better balance in reaching women. But the secret of doing so appears to lie in not targeting women at all. "Automakers who assume all women want the same things in a vehicle, or for that matter, that what they want is always different from what men want, are making a big mistake," says Ms. Klix. "Women are too diverse and too large a consumer group to be considered just a market niche." That argument carries over into advertising strategy as well. In fact, some of the most well-received campaigns of the 1990s show women in a positive way but weren't conceived as efforts directed strictly at females. General Motors Corp.'s Saturn subsidiary has been lauded for its TV spot showing Erin Walling, a prospective female car buyer, negotiating with a group of tough-talking dealership salesmen who mispronounce her name and pitch the value of seatbelts rather than real features of the car. Then she goes to Saturn, where she's treated respectfully and offered a test drive. TURNABOUT FAIR PLAY The spot ends with the woman saying she ended up taking a job as a Saturn salesperson and now takes particular pleasure in showing men the vanity mirror in the car. The Hal Riney & Partners-created commercial is based on a true story, says Dianne Romanelli, national advertising coordinator at Saturn, and didn't start out as an effort solely for women. "The strategy was to show people how the Saturn shopping experience is different," she says. "The spot focuses on things that are important to our buyers such as our no-hassle, no-haggle policy. It just so happens that women really respond to that." She adds, "Women definitely feel disrespected, as if they are being asked to choose a color and nothing else, and sometimes asked to come back with their husbands." Another '90s-style take on women is offered in Leo Burnett USA's commercial for Oldsmobile's Aurora. The spot shows a woman at a boring cocktail party imagining herself inside a colorful painting on the wall while happily driving her Aurora. It wasn't conceived as a commercial for women either. Greg Taubeneck, exec VP-group creative director at Burnett, says the original storyboard featured a man in the title role. "But then we thought, if we put a woman in, it would be a little less expected." The result struck a nerve. "We've had nice feedback, people saying it's nice to see women out of context. A lot of minivan advertising, for example, shows women as chauffeurs." According to Chrysler, women accounted for 53% of car purchases last year, and they spend $65 billion a year on automobiles and trucks. Moreover, women account for 48% of principal drivers of cars, according to J.D. Power & Associates, and they are principal drivers of 26% of light trucks, including sports-utility vehicles. TELLING IT STRAIGHT Part of the popularity of SUVs among women is due to Detroit's straight-shooting advertising aimed at them. Mr. Fitzpatrick says that when he was working on the Chevrolet Blazer account at Campbell-Ewald, GM's Chevrolet Division initially sold only 25,000 vehicles. DON'T POISON THE WELL The decision was then made to target women but subtly, so as not to "poison the well for men," at the time the primary Blazer buyers. The agency's first effort for Blazer directed at women, using a fashion theme and a pitch similar to those used for station wagons, bombed; "It didn't work for women," he says. Instead, Chevrolet decided to "tell it like it is," remembers Mr. Fitzpatrick, pitching the high seats in the vehicle, which give a sense of control to women. After only six months of these ads, begun only in women's magazines but expanded to general media, Chevy sold 250,000 Blazers. At Volvo, the percentage of women as primary drivers of its wagons is 85%, thanks to the safety positioning the company has been using in its advertising since the mid-1950s in the U.S., says Mr. Austin. But that's been accomplished with Volvo rarely doing ads aimed strictly at female buyers, he says. An exception was a women's liberation-inspired 1970s TV spot showing a woman steering a large domestic station wagon out of a crowded supermarket parking lot in the rain with the themeline, "How can women get into the mainstream if they can't get out of the parking lot?" PINK & ROBIN'S EGG BLUE Mr. Austin says the auto industry has come a long way from what he calls the "Hi sweetie, here's a pink car" mentality that stretched into the 1970s with such tactics as a robin's egg blue Firebird once offered by Pontiac. Now, he says, the strategy is to "speak to customers as potential buyers, not as simply men or women." Indeed, Detroit has progressed in its pursuit of the woman driver and buyer, although taking some ill-conceived detours and hairpin turns. But oddly enough, one of the best, most modern-thinking ads to include women as a target appeared back in 1923. Heralded as one of the best examples of copywriting, the famous Jordan Playboy magazine ad penned by company founder Ned Jordan himself pitched the sense of escapism a car can offer and the sheer joy of driving. It reads: "Somewhere west of Laramie, there's a bronco-busting, steer-roping girl who knows what I'm talking about. She can tell you what a sassy pony, that's a cross between greased lightning and the place where it hits, can do with eleven hundred pounds of steel and action when he's going high, wide and handsome. The truth is-The Playboy was built for her."

offered the fair sex a pink purse included in the car's purchase and a custom-made storage place.;Quick change: Ford in the 1950s showed Ann Hart, ``weighing in at 98 lbs.'' (l.) easily handling a car that far outweighed her. But just 10 years later Ford

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