Score Another Win for the Cycling Community: State Farm Ad Being Pulled

I mentioned the State Farm ad in an earlier post that I found to be in poor taste. Streetsblog, a blog with a great deal of readership, had the following response from Tim VanHoof, Director of Marketing Communications for State Farm:

As I mentioned in an earlier comment, I am sorry the advertisement offended anyone. Our intention with this particular ad was to recognize and empathize with the everyday challenge of high gas prices, and suggest that State Farm could help by providing lower auto insurance rates than a person may be receiving from their current provider.

But clearly we have heard your concerns. In fact, we take very seriously each letter, email and blog comment we receive.

During the past few days, I discussed the perception of this advertisement with others at State Farm, and we decided the right thing to do would be to discontinue it. We will remove this ad as quickly as possible from the current rotation schedule.

Please know that State Farm is very concerned about doing what we can to improve the health, safety and environment in our communities.

For example, in numerous states, employees can earn up to $1.50 a day by ridesharing, walking, or riding a bike to work. We also have more than 1,200 employees participating in van pooling throughout the country.

State Farm has also been a supporter of bicycle safety through the thousands of bicycle rodeos we’ve held for children throughout the US and Canada. We remain open to discussion about how State Farm might partner with the bicycling community in the future.

We value direct consumer input as we make decisions about our advertising messages and safety programs. As a mutual company with no stockholders, we work hard to be good stewards of our policyholders’ money.

For more information about State Farm, go to statefarm.com http://www.statefarm.com/about/csr/csr.asp or talk to a local State Farm agent.

Thank you,
Tim Van Hoof
Director of Marketing Communications
State Farm

The whole post and thread of comments can be found HERE. So for those of you who LIKE the commercial, you will soon be relegated to YouTube to watch it.