Audi’s Response To GM’s Norway Super Bowl Ad Is Brilliant

We’re definitely not the first to think GM’s new Super Bowl commercial starring Will Ferrell is a little unusual. Titled “No Way, Norway,” Ferrell goes on a rant about Norway’s embrace of electric vehicles and that America needs to get on board with electrification. Despite his attempt to reach the Scandinavian country in a Cadillac Lyriq, Ferrell winds up in Sweden.

But Audi felt the need to respond to Ferrell’s antics and GM’s message by embracing Norway’s love of EVs, especially the Audi e-tron, which happens to be the best-selling EV in the country. The German automaker recruited “Game of Thrones” actor and “proud Norwegian” Kristofer Hivju for not one but three short ads.

Their theme is “not to hate, but to imitate. Hivju even encounters the globe punched by Ferrell in one of them. The other two involve pizza and fish. We know, it’s strange but strange and quirky gets attention. Audi’s media team in Norway responded in only two days or so time to the GM ad, and we’ve included all three here for your viewing pleasure. Apparently, salmon-covered pizza is a thing in Norway rather than anchovies.

If you recall, one of the teasers leading up to GM’s main commercial showed Ferrell ordering pizzas for all of Norway while pretending to be Norwegian. Hivju responds by putting an entire salmon on top of a pizza and taking a bite. He also beats a salmon against his head in the third ad. We’re anxiously waiting for Ferrell’s hopeful response.

Norway has long been a hot zone for EVs, especially Teslas and, more recently, the Audi e-tron. A total of 9,227 e-tron SUVs and Sportbacks were sold there last year, beating the previous best-selling Tesla Model 3. To compare, 7,202 e-trons left Audi lots in the US in 2020.

All told, battery-electric vehicles comprised 54 percent of light vehicle sales in Norway last year, an increase of 12 percent from the year prior. Only a decade ago, that figure was 1 percent. America’s EV sales are just 2 percent, for comparison. The US clearly still has a long way to go.