A Guide to Claims in Car Commercials

If a runaway roller coaster loaded with dynamite were headed for a Chevy pickup, could the owner jump into the truck, start it and get away fast enough to avoid being blown up?

A General Motors advertisement on television conveyed that message, showing that the Chevy could get away but that a Ford truck got zapped by the dynamite.

It is hard to measure whether this ad or countless others like it influence prospective customers, but they raise an important question: To what extent can consumers trust the comparative claims made by auto makers?

In the case of at least some television advertising, manufacturers must submit extensive documentation to prove that their claims are valid before a network will air them.

GM, for example, was required to submit a documentation package to the networks measuring two inches thick before its ad was accepted for broadcast. The information showed that the Chevy truck could accelerate faster than the Ford.

The documentation was prepared by AMCI Inc., a little-known firm located in Carlsbad and Detroit. The company is in the business of running tests to verify claims that auto producers want to make in their advertising.

The networks have required rigorous testing to prove advertising claims since the mid-1970s, when the Federal Trade Commission relaxed its rules barring comparative advertising.

After an initial round of comparative ads led to lawsuits, the networks decided they had to protect themselves, said James Wangers, general managing partner of AMCI.

Local television stations, radio and the print media never faced the same scrutiny and do not police car makers’ claims to the same extent, he said.

To validate advertising claims, AMCI tests each claim 72 times in various types of driving tests covering fuel efficiency, noise, braking, acceleration, passing and emergency maneuvering.

Under network rules, AMCI must buy cars off dealer lots without any indication that they will be used for testing. The dealers must submit affidavits to the networks, attesting that the test cars were not specially prepped in any way.

AMCI tests only performance claims. Claims involving a car’s dimensions and capacities are verified against data compiled and published by the Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Assn. When a manufacturer claims that a car has 42 inches of leg room, for example, it must use a strict formula developed by the association in its measurements.

Generally, Wangers said, the claims that auto manufacturers make on network television are valid. For example, he said he has never seen claims made when the margin of superiority was negligible or when a claim could not be proven in repeated tests.

It does not hurt for consumers to use a measure of common sense when evaluating claims that may seem impressive. A lot of claims are vague--asserting, for example, that a car handles well. But handling is a misused term, Wangers said, because it can mean different things. Good handling can apply to how easy a car is to park or how well it turns at high speed.

Sometimes claims don’t mean a given car is any better than other cars. A Nissan Altima was recently shown in one ad with wine glasses stacked on its hood while the car rode on a dynamometer at 100 m.p.h.

It was supposed to demonstrate how smoothly the Altima rides. Although the ad legitimately showed that the Altima performed the trick, it is also true that many other cars, even relatively inexpensive ones, can do the same thing.

“They don’t say they are the only ones that can do that,” Wangers said. “But Altima did certify that the test was real.”