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January 19, 2015

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Car ‘glamour girls’ evolve into product specialists

GLAMOUR girls have attracted buyers to cars since auto shows began in the early 20th century, but this long-standing tradition is under attack as businesses and advocacy groups alike have grown uncomfortable with the use of women’s bodies as a driver for foot traffic.

Yang Xueliang, director of public relations for Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd, a Chinese private automaker, said on his microblog recently that he was informed by the organizing committee of the Shanghai Automotive Exhibition that “auto show models are to be banned this year.”

A Xinhua report earlier this month exposed a father’s concerns about bringing his 10-year-old son to automotive exhibitions. “He loves cars,” said the father. “But it was no ‘automobile show.’ It was a ‘body show.’”

US activists are displeased as well, as a viral photo of a Fiat advertisement depicted a car and the text, “If it were a lady, it would get its bottom pinched.” That was subsequently “fixed” by an activist spray painting the words: “If this was a lady, she’d run you down.”

Mounting pressure on organizers has resulted in a change in the way car models, originally dubbed “glamour girls,” have been presented to the public.

Margery Krevsky, who founded Productions Plus in 1981, realized that most of the people standing beside cars who she thought were “wonderful” were just models. That disappointed her, and as a result, she decided to found a company based on the idea that a “glamour girl” needed a fundamental change.

“My idea was, have very intelligent, well-spoken, and knowledgeable people beside the cars, both men and women. Usually attractive, dressed very well, and representing the brand,” she said. “They can talk about technology, the automation, horsepower, design, or even the culture of the car.”

More than 30 years later at the 2015 Detroit Auto Show, the industry has changed with Krevsky’s guidance. The glamour girls are gone. Krevsky’s idea struck a chord with car manufacturers, who began using her firm’s services.

Today, glamour girls have been renamed product specialists, and they go through rigorous training and must pass extensive knowledge-based testing. “The car cannot talk so it needs a second entity beside it. The human being, the attractive girl, the attractive gentleman really adds to the car by being able to talk about it,” said Krevsky.

Extensive training

Tiffany Doorn, a product specialist for Porsche, is one of Krevsky’s product specialists. “We are trained by Porsche cars in North America every year on the cars,” Doorn, sharply dressed with immaculately tailored look, told Xinhua at the Porsche booth.

The product specialist describes her training as extensive, but in case she doesn’t know the answer to a question, Porsche has equipped her with an iPad when she needs to look up an elusive tidbit of information.

Doorn used to be a successful model, winning the title of Miss Washington 2006 in the Miss USA Pageant. But she always had higher aspirations, as she had a degree in communications with an emphasis in public relations.

“We know about the product. For me, personally, I have a passion for the product, so I love talking about all of them. I like showing that with the public,” she said.

Doorn soon went back to work, schmoozing with members of the press and interested parties from other car manufacturers trying to get a peek at competitors’ work.

Eventually, Krevsky sees the Chinese market adopting product specialist models over car models as the industry evolves. “I think it is the wave of the future. Very attractive people, but certainly, people who can talk car. Because the car is the star,” she said.

(Xinhua)




 

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