Sega's promotional Smart car displays not-so-smart marketing

[wraggster]

What kind of car would you associate with Sonic the Hedgehog? Does Sonic have any defining characteristics that some cars share? Ah, that's right! He's small! Smaller than a normal car.

... at least, that's how Sega of France's thinking seems to have gone. A Sega fan spotted this Sonic Unleashed-branded Smart and sent a picture into Sega's Sonic blog. We suppose it's appropriate given the game it's advertising: it makes as much sense to pitch a game about running fast with a pokey, bulbous little car as it does to make half of that game about a stretchy-armed werehog. At least the car's mostly blue.

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/05/19/se...art-marketing/

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I don't think that Sega hired a Smart to do their advertising.
They paid the car-rental agency in order to put Sonic on the cars and to reduce the cost of renting one.