Article Suggests Coda Among Leaders in Electric Vehicles

I’m one of these people who’s always interested in product placement – you know, that Coors Light that the handsome and likeable guy in the movie you’re watching just happens to be sipping, or the United Airlines jumbo jet that brings his sweetheart back home to him. Advertisers pay substantial fees to have their products featured in various places – especially where viewers will subconsciously regard them as cool and appealing.  The trick, of course, is to make the placement appear natural and uncontrived.

So I was amused by an article in this month’s Westways (American Automobile Association) magazine on electric vehicles, by journeyman auto writer Peter Bohr, featuring a graphic that depicts a number of EVs parachuting into our world. The biggest? Coda, of course. Not Tesla, Nissan, Mitsubishi, Peugeot, Smith, BYD, Renault, or Chevy (who actually sell and deliver EVs). No, it’s Coda, a company whose revolving door in the executive suite, track record of delays and dashed expectations, and juggling of business strategies has rendered it a farce, rather than a force, in the EV world.

It’s hard to believe that a journalist of Bohr’s caliber doesn’t know this.  So I’m assuming that we have a case of product placement here – though again, I could caution Westways: guys, you gotta make it credible.