Two years after running a Big Game spot that sparked a fair amount of backlash, Quicken Loans is returning to the Super Bowl. The Detroit-based brand is running a 60-second ad in the second quarter of the game on Feb. 4 to highlight its Rocket Mortgage product.
"The timing is right," says Casey Hurbis, who joined Quicken as chief marketing officer last spring after six years with Fiat. "We launched Rocket Mortgage and introduced it to the world two years ago and it's been growing and maturing. Now's the time to be back in front of 140 million people and share what we've been up to."
Hurbis declined to comment about any celebrities featured in the ad, which Quicken will not release until after the game.
In 2016, Quicken ran its first Super Bowl spot to advertise Rocket Mortgage ("What We Were Thinking"). By noting how easy getting a mortgage could be, the ad invited social media criticism from people who remembered the sub-prime home lending crisis of 2008. (Quicken reiterated Thursday that it did not play a part in the housing meltdown.) It was created with Fallon under Quicken President and Chief Marketing Officer Jay Farner, who has since been promoted to CEO.
For the new Super Bowl commercial, Quicken worked with Brooklyn-based Huge Inc., winner of a jump-ball pitch request last year. This is Huge's first Super Bowl spot. The video will again highlight the two-year-old Rocket Mortgage product, and its additional features; it will also kick off a larger campaign that will continue running through 2018.
The new push follows a campaign last spring that also featured Rocket Mortgage, telling consumers to "Mortgage confidently." Such sentiment will continue in new messaging in a "fun and entertaining and educational way," Hurbis says.
Quicken spent $328.9 million on measured media in the U.S. in 2016, according to Kantar Media. A 60-second Super Bowl slot this year could cost advertisers more than $10 million, according to industry experts.
Quicken, which was founded in 1985, put its media account into review last month.
