The UH advertising organization, Cougar Concepts, is one of the 23 teams invited to participate in the Chevy Campus Promotions program.
Chevy and EdVenture Partners, an organization that fosters industry-education partnerships, are working together in the Campus Promotions program to provide students with hands-on experience in creating and implementing marketing strategies. Advertising professor Larry Kelley works with the group every year.
“Working with EdVenture Partners is great,” Kelley said. “It provides students with a budget in order to implement it in a real world scenario.”
The teams of students from universities around the nation were asked to research and develop a marketing strategy for four of Chevrolet’s vehicles: the Camaro, the Equinox, the Malibu, and Chevy’s newest model, the Cruze.
Each team was given a $3,000 budget to market the vehicles to students 18-24 years old, find a way to integrate the vehicles into campus life and align Chevrolet with the University. The Cougar Concepts team came up with the slogan, “A New Tradition of Excellence.”
“Just like UH strives for excellence, Chevrolet is (too) by building more fuel-efficient, stylish and reliable vehicles,” Account Coordinator Stephanie Villacorta said.
The Cougar Concepts team has conducted over 400 surveys.
“We are a part of the market we are trying to target,” Villacorta said. “We just tried to think about what advertising would appeal to us and call our attention.”
The culmination of the campaign class’ work was an event held at the University Center on Nov. 10, where over 300 consumers turned out.
“The all-new Chevrolet Cruze piqued the most interest since it hasn’t been seen before,” Villacorta said. “But the Camaro definitely stole the show.”
The Cougar Concepts team is now moving on to the final step of the competition, which involves creating a 100-page plan book to pitch to the client in a formal presentation on Dec. 2. The plan book will also be sent to senior Chevrolet management in Detroit.
