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Toyota: Spends $1 Million an Hour on Safety?

Unless you have been asleep for the past month or two, you probably have seen the bright red Toyota commercial touting their commitment to safety:

It says:

“At Toyota, we care about your safety. That’s why we’re investing a million dollars every hour to improve our technology and your safety. It’s an investment that has helped Toyota win multiple top safety pick awards for 2010 by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. No other brand has won more. These top safety picks and all our new safety innovations are available at Toyota.com/safety . “

The average TV watcher will likely take away the message that Toyota cares about safety, has won a lot of safety awards, and is spending a million dollars an hour to improve safety.

Mouse Print* asked the company how they arrived at the million dollars an hour figure.

*MOUSE PRINT:

“The $1 million figure represents Toyota’s total global spending on R&D to enhance the safety and technology of its vehicles. [Toyota] projects $760 billion yen [to be spent in FY2011] on R&D. Breaking down the calculations, 90 yen to the dollar equals $8.44 billion, which works out to $2,318,310 per day or $965,962 an hour, rounded to $1 million an hour. In any event, any fluctuations in the yen would impact the exact final figure.”

The key issue is not so much that they rounded up the figure to a million dollars an hour (exaggerating the amount spent by almost $30 million a year) but rather that the number is TOTAL spending on research and development, not just on safety issues. The company could not provide a number for the actual amount just spent on safety, but it certainly is less than the total spent on R&D, and therefore is not $1 million dollars an hour.

When this discrepancy and interpretation of the commercial was pointed out to Toyota, they responded:

“As the commercials mention, the $1 million figure represents Toyota’s R&D spending on new technology and safety, much of it allocated to quality and safety features.”

If you parse the key sentence in the commercial, it does indeed say that they are spending $1 million an hour to “improve our technology AND your safety.” But by using the term “safety” seven times in 30 seconds, and displaying the words “safety” or “safe” on the screen for much of the commercial, listeners are likely to get the net impression that Toyota is spending a million dollars an hour to “improve our technology FOR your safety.” We don’t think the average consumer would take away from the commercial that the company is spending some number less than a million dollars an hour on safety.

In Massachusetts, we have an advertising regulation that provides:

“An advertisement as a whole may be unfair or deceptive although each representation separately construed is literally true.”

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CVS: Sign Up for Offers, Get a $4 Coupon?

In the CVS drugstore circular on August 1, the company promised to give customers who signed up for their email list a $4 coupon:

The unreadable fine print in the reduced size picture above only refers to the company’s privacy policy, and that people already on their list are not eligible.

Seemed like an easy way to save $4 to Linda D., a regular Mouse Print* reader. So she signed up at their website. She  filled out her name and email address on the page that contained this description (actual size):

So far, so good. Then she got an email from CVS with her coupon:

Excuse me, $4 off a $20 purchase? Where did that come from? There was no mention whatsoever about this coupon requiring a minimum purchase in the circular. Even visiting the CVS website on the page where you fill in your name and email address, there was no disclosure right on that page either [since changed as noted below].  If you were to click to see the sample coupon, you would have seen the $20 minimum purchase requirement, but few would probably have a reason to view the sample coupon.

Most people would only find out they’ve been hoodwinked after they had given CVS their personal information.

Mouse Print* contacted the PR folks at CVS to ask if they didn’t think this promotion was deceptive, and whether they would now provide people who signed up with a no-strings-attached $4 off coupon. They responded, in part:

“On the sign-up page, a sample coupon was displayed setting forth the details of the offer.

While we feel the information was available, CVS/pharmacy appreciates customer feedback and moving forward, we have enhanced the language for this ad to indicate more clearly that this is an offer for a $4 off $20 coupon. This change has already been made online at www.cvs.com/email. We have also made this change to our circular and it will be reflected on the online circular beginning on 8/22 and due to printing lead times, the new ad will begin running in the printed circular the week of 9/5.”

So, basically CVS decided against doing the honorable thing right away — offering those who signed up based on the misleading ad a no-strings-attached $4 coupon. And notice that they made no mention of running a retraction in newspapers across the country, as might be required by various state advertising laws.

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Dish Network: #1 in Customer Satisfaction?

In several TV commercials, the President of Dish Network touts the company’s low prices and success in becoming number one in customer satisfaction. In fact, he unequivocally proclaims:

“Dish Network is ranked number one in customer satisfaction among ALL [emphasis added] cable and satellite providers.” [Commercial one, and commercial two. ]

Not so fast, Mr. Ergen. There is a nearly unreadable disclaimer on the screen.

*MOUSE PRINT:

“According to the 2010 American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) survey results for the US largest cable and satellite TV providers. The claim excludes fiber optics carriers.”

If you look at the actual survey results from the University of Michigan for May 2010, you discover the true ranking of companies:

*MOUSE PRINT:

Funny thing, the real number one-rated company for customer satisfaction is Verizon FiOS and the real number two company is AT&T U-verse. In essence, Dish is saying, if you exclude the number one and number two company, we are number one! That is kind of like Alamo declaring “We are number one (if you don’t count Hertz and Avis)”.

Dish Network was invited twice by Mouse Print* to comment on its advertising practices but did not respond.

Disclosure: MrConsumer is a member of Verizon’s Consumer Advisory Board (but even if he wasn’t, Dish Network’s ads would have been subject of a Mouse Print* commentary).

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