Toyota Adds Wagner, Jacobellis, Ligety To Pyeongchang Marketing Campaign

Toyota has selected 14 new athletes to lead its global Olympics campaign in the U.S., joining five previously chosen ambassadors to help the automaker begin to expand its reputation beyond cars. The athletes will play a role in “Start Your Impossible,” a campaign running in 40 markets that will connect their stories of overcoming odds to Toyota’s products that help people become more mobile and independent. It is the company’s first campaign to not focus on cars. Toyota this year became the Olympics’ first worldwide sponsor in the mobility category, a designation that includes cars but also includes technology to help people with limited mobility manage their day-to-day activities better. Toyota does sell those products, but Toyota North America Group VP/GM Jack Hollis says this is primarily a brand play for a company, currently best known as an automaker, that wants to diversify its identity. “This is not just a product expansion, but a full brand expansion,” Hollis said. Toyota tonight on NBCSN will air the first of 10 creative spots developed by Tokyo-based Dentsu and L.A.-based Saatchi & Saatchi. At a ceremony in Tokyo today, the company signed a separate deal to become a global sponsor of Special Olympics Int'l, not related to the IOC.