Ford’s ongoing communications brief is to drive their brand purpose and values through communications that not only deepens desire for their products but also supports their commitment to be a leader in diversity and inclusion.

The brand has proudly been a driving force in building ‘tough’ muscle-truck culture, but unfortunately, this culture can sometimes bring a toxic undercurrent of homophobia.

When Ford posted a YouTube film launching its Ranger Raptor, the homophobia surfaced, with a commenter describing the colour as “very Gay!!"

Ford, as a long-term champion of LGBTQI+ inclusion through its 25-year+ ERG Ford Pride, decided enough was enough. How could they flip this comment into a way of demonstrating unwavering support for its diverse audience and workforce, in a way that could also drive meaningful change across the industry?

This offensive comment became the catalyst for Ford to respond swiftly, decisively and meaningfully.

Ford's brand purpose is one of ambition and inclusivity: To help build a better world, where everyone is free to pursue their dreams. They believe in the power of creating a world with fewer obstacles and limits.'

Yet, the undercurrent of homophobia in the celebrated truck culture - a culture that Ford played a significant role in building - is doing the exact opposite to the LGBTQI+ community. Social listening has indicated a widespread culture of homophobia in the category - from more casual discrimination, like debates over which pick up truck is the 'least gay' to more targeted and vitriolic hate.

A big part of the problem is the dismissal of casually homophobic language; being seen by brands and media as not that important, but the direct impact it has on the LGBTQI+ community has been proven to be significant.

Ford re-edited the original film giving their Ranger Raptor a photoshopped gold glitter and Pride rainbow paint job, and posted The ‘Very Gay’ Raptor across their social channels to show solidarity with the LGBTQI+ community.

Further highlighting muscle truck culture’s homophobia problem, its new paint job proved polarising, receiving responses of disgust and delight, including requests for the Very Gay Raptor to be ‘made real’. So that’s exactly what they did. Ford’s Very Gay Raptor made its IRL debut at Cologne’s Christopher Street Day Parade, an event that Ford has supported for over 25 years.

Ford not only called out homophobia, they proudly shared their support by repurposing one of their most ‘badass’ nameplates into an unapologetic beacon of change.

As a major protagonist in automotive culture, Ford recognised that this can come with an undercurrent of homophobia. A long-term champion of LGBTQI+ inclusion, Ford embraced the challenge to drive industry change through a clear message to car lovers, everywhere: Ford is redefining tough in order to drive out discrimination.

Working closely with Ford’s Pride ERG and the tonality was intentional: Proud, not aggressive. Playful but purposeful. Reactive but not retaliatory. This was about allyship, not opportunism.

When it came to the ‘IRL Very Gay Raptor’ Ford let it speak for itself. Revealed at Cologne’s Christopher Street Day Parade, proudly driven by members of Ford’s Pride ERG.

The campaign was executed as follows:

1. JUNE 2021: Original clapback social post ‘Very gay is a compliment, right?’ (Pan-European distribution via Ford’s Twitter and IG, no paid support)

2. JULY 2021: IRL Very Gay Raptor at Christopher Street Day Parade, Cologne & supporting press release – distributed to German consumer, auto and LGBTQI+ media and international newswires

3. JULY 2021: LinkedIn post from Head of FordPro Europe

4. JULY / ongoing… Very Gay Raptor employee tour of Ford plants in Germany & UK and appearance at relevant automotive and LGBTQI+ events subsequently

5. AUGUST 2021: Follow up social post ‘You asked us to make it real, so we did’ (pan-European distribution via Ford’s twitter and IG, no paid support)

The plan was carefully crafted in conjunction with the UK and German chairpersons of Ford Pride – Ford’s LGBTQI+ resource group, in order to ensure the right tonality.

Over 200m media and social impressions to date:

• 140+ media articles, with a reach of over 22 million (Prime-Cision). This earned media generated over 146m+ impressions and 38k total post interactions on Facebook.

• Recorded from Ford of Europe’s social listening tool, Visibrain, it is estimated that social content gained over 5.9m+ impressions, 118k engagements on Instagram and around 32m+ impressions, 4.5k+ tweets/re-tweets via Twitter.

• On the Ford of Europe channels, we recorded more than 4m organic impressions and 307k+ total engagements on the recent VGR post. These results are significantly higher than Ford’s usual organic performance across Twitter and Instagram.

• Popular TikTok influencer Josh Helfgott (4.5M followers) posted a positive video of the #VeryGayRaptor, viewed 5.5 million times, 1.3M likes and 12.3k comments

The Very Gay Raptor has kickstarted Ford's leadership of a cross-industry anti-discrimination program called Driving Pride to help transform the category.