Aussies know how to make a Toyota Land Cruiser commercial

A new commercial from Toyota Australia proves that it’s possible to hawk the Land Cruiser. It has just the right amount of heritage and humor, and it shows a bunch of Cruisers tearing through the Outback. It’s much better than any American Land Cruiser ad, in that we have never seen Toyota market the Land Cruiser in the US. But the Aussies, they are serious about their Land Cruisers down there.

The ad is pretty straightforward. It shows a bunch of different Land Cruiser owners doing Land Cruiser stuff. There’s a miner, a couple of families with kids, friends on a road trip, and an explorer running for his life. They’re all driving different types of Land Cruisers and sing a shanty as they converge on a farm picnic.

Somehow, though, they manage to squeeze anything an admaker could want into the 60-second spot. First, there’s history, in the form of a J20 Land Cruiser. There’s a few moments of levity, in the form of the guy running from the emu, the couple getting splashed with mud, and the dad who can sleep through anything. It also shows off the Land Cruiser’s many capabilities, whether it’s towing a boat or plowing through a trail that would strand lesser cars.

Then there’s the more understated aspects. One of the best ways to market to a consumer is to make them feel like, if they buy the product, that they’ll be part of something bigger. Having all the drivers singing the same song, driving to the same destination, in a diverse spectrum of Land Cruisers makes you feel like you’d be gaining entry into a club if you had one too.

The line repeated throughout the song is, “This Land Cruiser drives us home.” The implication is an oft-repeated truism from LC owners. It’s the only car that can take you anywhere in the world, and get you back — a subtle play on the fact that Land Cruisers are known to be extremely reliable, unlike the off-roaders made by other companies. Last but not least, the ad ends with an “Oh, what a feeling!” jump that Toyota USA abandoned long ago. It’s still a staple of of Toyota commercials in Australia.

The irony of course is that Toyota hardly needs to market the Land Cruiser in Australia, one of the most consistent Land Cruiser markets on Earth. It’s the go-to SUV down under, and Aussies get a much wider variety than we do. They have the J250, the only Toyota-branded Land Cruiser we get stateside, the J300 “real” Land Cruiser that we only get in Lexus LX form, and the tried and true J70, which we have never gotten in any form and has been sold there continuously even when it took a hiatus in Japan.

It’s a mystery to us why Toyota USA hasn’t marketed the Land Cruiser in the same manner here. Instead, Toyota relies on word of mouth and enthusiast sites to spread the Land Cruiser gospel. That means the average consumer has to be at least somewhat keyed in to the enthusiast world to consider one. That explains why in most American cities, despite a plethora of Camrys and RAV4s, Land Cruisers are outnumbered by Range Rovers ten to one. Australia, on the other hand, is Land Cruiser country and this ad really, uh, drives the point home.