Automakers mostly shying away from Super Bowl 2025 ads

• Somehow, an ice-cream company may have one of the best car-centred 2025 Super Bowl ads
  
• Automaker support for commercials during the Big Game has cratered this year
  
• Only Jeep and Ram are expected to air spots, and all the usual suspects have said they’re out

Some of the best commercials spring from the most unlikely of brands—and for proof, you have to look no further than the teasers for an upcoming spot by H?agen-Dazs. Surprising us all by dropping a teaser two weeks ago for its upcoming Super Bowl ad (yes, we live in a world where there are theatrical trailers for freaking commercials, now) the American ice cream brand will apparently be spending big bucks on a car-chase-centered ad during the Big Game.

The teaser shows a 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle and 1966 Plymouth Satellite duking it out in traffic, only to be stopped in their tracks by a delivery guy bringing cases of tasty H?agen-Dazs across the street and into a store.

What in the Fast & Furious might be happening? Who knows what the tag-line is, but there will likely be some sort of allusion to a heist, since that’s the title apparently given to the ad by its creators. Hey, any time we get to see a pair of classic muscle cars scything through regular traffic is a good day in our books. Here’s hoping the ad company didn’t select “Civic.mp3” for the soundtrack for these V8 beasts (spoiler alert: it sounds like they got it relatively right, per the teasers).

Elsewhere, the pros at Ad Week have run the numbers and demonstrated that traditional car companies have been shunning the Super Bowl in recent years. According to their tally, the auto industry’s share of airtime has dropped to less than 10% in recent years, down from the days when over one-third of Big Game ads were about vehicles. Shame, as some dandies were made over the years.

In the past, brands ranging from Ford and General Motors to Hyundai and Honda have splashed out money for airtime, but they’ve all since walked back their participation in what are unquestionably the most expensive ad blocks on. A quartet of automakers who bought ad time last year, including Toyota and VW, have declined to re-up for ad space during the 59th Super Bowl between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles next weekend. The only carmaker ads we can expect for sure are from Jeep and Ram.

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