It’s hard to ignore the sweeping changes to corporate and federal diversity, equity and inclusion policies, as brands like Target, Walmart and now Paramount, for example, continue to retool or walk back their DEI policies. Hyundai, meanwhile, says its multicultural marketing efforts and budget commitments will remain in place.
Erik Thomas, director of experiential and multicultural marketing at Hyundai Motor America, told Digiday that multicultural audiences represent an estimated 30% of the automotive brand sales. (Thomas did not disclose exact revenue figures.) According to Hyundai’s 2024 annual and Q4 business results, the automotive brand’s global annual revenue increased 7.7% to 175.2 trillion South Korean Won (or slightly over $120 billion U.S. dollars). Meaning, there’s a business imperative behind Hyundai’s multicultural strategy – it continue to drive car sales, something DEI and cultural marketing experts have pointed to in the argument against DEI’s dismantling.
Last month, Hyundai put out its latest multicultural marketing campaign, “Play for the Car,” aimed at Black shoppers with paid media across diverse media, including entertainment channels like BET, TV One and Bounce, and publications like Blavity and Ebony Magazine. The campaign, from creative shop Culture Brands, will also have spots in NBA games this year. Culture Brands is the independent, minority and female-owned agency Hyundai selected as its African American marketing agency of record back in 2021. Since 2022, the automotive company has partnered with Lopez Negrete Communications as its Hispanic marketing agency of record.
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