GM Cars in the Transformers - Inventive Marketing

Posted July 19th, 2007 by Amy Gifford

I saw the movie Transformers last week and was shocked at the two and half hours of movie time stuffed with GM product placements.

As a former GM advertising employee, I noticed immediately, and I prided myself on that for about 10 seconds after the movie was over. I was then surprised to find that everyone in the theater was talking about all the GM cars and product placement in the movie as well. It was apparently that noticeable.

GM didn't even have to search out this film opportunity. Hollywood came to them, even before the automaker's executives had decided to show a Camaro concept coupe at the auto show in Detroit in 2006, and later to put the new Camaro into production.

Starting with the Camaro, check out the GM product placements.

Check out our favorite Transformer, Bumblebee aka the brand new Chevrolet Camaro. The vehicles used in the movie were made especially for it, because as you know, the Camaro isn't even in production yet.

Then there was Ironhide the rugged off-roader played by a GMC TopKick pickup truck with a Duramax diesel engine.

And believe it or not, the search and rescue vehicle, Ratchet ,is played by a Hummer H2 that's painted a fluorescent light green and modified with a winch and brush guard in front, shovels on its sides and off-road lights.

And last but not least, Jazz, the Pontiac Solstice. The Solstice also had to be specially created because GM was only selling it as a convertible when filming began and movie producers wanted Jazz to be a gray, hardtop Solstice.