Did you ever wonder if a shopping cart dreamed of more than ferrying groceries back and forth from the supermarket? That question is answered with wit and aplomb in Jeep Cherokee’s "Cart Love," a spot via FCB Worldwide, Southfield, Mich., directed by Kinka Usher of Santa Monica-based House of Usher Films.
The spot begins with an everyday grocery store occurrence when a shopping cart knocks into the bumper of a Jeep Cherokee in the store’s parking lot. The difference here is that this shopping cart has visions of a world that extends far beyond the produce section. After hitting the Cherokee, the cart is transported to natural settings eons away from the stultifying confines of the parking lot. The self-propelled cart charges through these settings accompanied by swelling music that crescendos as the cart conquers even more difficult terrain. All on its own, the cart navigates over rocky paths, rolls through a stream and plunges though a forest. Finally, the cart triumphantly surmounts a craggy mountain height as the camera swirls around the peak from above. But its magical mountain tour ends when a bag boy yanks it back to grocery store reality by racking it into a row of other carts. The music ends abruptly and the dream is over, but the spot’s narrator notes that Jeep Cherokee is "the role model for four-wheel vehicles great and small."
Gary Topolewski, executive creative director/chief creative officer at FCB, said the concept for "Cart Love" evolved out of Jeep’s position as the "original" SUV. "Everything we do is based on the authenticity of the Jeep brand, and in keeping with that theme, we try to do things that only Jeep could do," said Topolewski, adding that the shopping cart functioned as a surrogate for other SUV brands that are trying to break into Jeep territory. "You do have a lot of ‘wannabes’ out there. Granted, there’s a lot of good products and SUVs are booming, but everybody is basically copying what Jeep has started … [so] you take something as absurd as a mundane shopping cart, and even those things want to be a Jeep."
Usher said that sticking to the simple and charming story was essential to making the spot work. Another key was creating a very unique shopping cart. To do that, Usher invested preparatory time at Reel Efx, North Hollywood, to test and design the shopping cart that was to be used in the spot. "I wanted to see how it moved and jostled, [and] I thought the spot would work best if I could create a personality for the cart," he said.
Part of the cart’s design was a given: So that it appeared self-propelled, it was rigged to a pulley system which was used during the shoot. Usher’s experimentation at Reel Efx yielded important insights about how to build a cart with character. After completing improvised research and development in the field, Usher and his Reel Efx compatriots settled on a setup in which they added lead to the bottom rails of the cart near its wheels. That added stability to the cart and kept it from tumbling over while crossing rough terrain.
Reel Efx built six models of the cart, all of which were brought to the shoot in Bozeman, Montana, but Usher ended up using only one cart for the entire spot. For some reason, that cart had a "bounce and a flair" that the other carts didn’t have. "This one cart just had a better personality than the rest of them, so we ended up using it for everything," Usher said, acknowledging that the prop department was very busy keeping the cart shipshape during the shoot. "It was just this magical cart, and in the long run, it was very valuable to do the kind of preparatory work that we did." Usher added that the cart had such a remarkable presence that it assumed almost mythical proportions in discussions amongst the production team.
Topolewski admitted to the irony in that since some SUV owners only use their car for urban journeys, the Jeep Cherokee itself might not end up traversing the rugged outdoor climes the shopping cart "imagines." "[Owners] may never take it off road, but they feel good about the fact that they can if they want to," he said.
