Vroom Super Bowl ad highlights need for inventory

Online used-vehicle retailer Vroom will return to the Super Bowl this year with an ad that highlights the company's ability to buy cars from consumers — and signals its thirst for inventory.

The ad, called "Flake the Musical," depicts a consumer ready to sell a vehicle through a peer-to-peer transaction only to have the buyer back out. The 30-second spot shows the woman dancing down a city street as she sings about finally finding a buyer for her vehicle before receiving a text message that the transaction is off.

"Never deal with flaky buyers again," a narrator says, as the scene flips to a Vroom-branded flatbed truck loading up the seller's vehicle.

As a shortage of microchips has constrained new-vehicle inventory and led to more demand and higher prices for used vehicles, auto retailers have pumped up their efforts to source inventory — including buying vehicles directly from consumers.

Vroom executives acknowledged that dynamic.

"The used-car marketplace has definitely seen a boom as a result of the impact the chip shortage and supply chain issues have created with new-vehicle inventory. For Vroom to meet this demand, we need the inventory to provide customers with as wide a variety of choices as possible, so purchasing is an incredibly important part of our business," Vroom Chief Marketing Officer Peter Scherr told Automotive News via email.

"Anyone who has tried to sell a car online knows it can be an extremely time-consuming and frustrating experience to deal with flaky potential buyers, so we wanted to showcase how easy and quick the experience of selling your car to Vroom can be," Scherr wrote of Vroom's 2022 Super Bowl ad.

Consumers can use Vroom's platform to get an appraisal and instant price on their vehicle that is valid for seven days or 250 miles, and the company arranges to pick up the vehicle.

New York-based Vroom made waves last year with its Super Bowl debut, "Dealership Pain," which depicted a dealership salesman threatening a customer with electric shock. The company told Automotive News at the time that it was intended as an exaggerated example of some consumers' dissatisfaction with traditional dealerships.

Franchised dealers, however, said the spot promoted outdated stereotypes even as the industry moves toward more digital transacting.

Vroom's ad will air during the fourth quarter of the Feb. 13 game. While the cost of a 30-second Super Bowl commercial varies, NBC was said to be seeking as much as $6.5 million for this year's slots, according to Automotive News affiliate Ad Age.