As its 17 million policyholders know, Geico is an auto insurance company with a gecko spokesman. As financial analysts know, Geico is among the top three car insurers in the country by market share.
And, as of today—grammar fans, prepare yourselves—Geico is now a verb, too.
“It feels good to Geico” is the carrier’s new slogan, taking the place of “Real service, real savings,” rolled out in 2020. But what does it mean to Geico, exactly?
It means getting that warm and fuzzy feeling when a huge corporation actually pays attention to you—or so four new spots from the Martin Agency suggest.
Two of the 30-second ads feature famous athletes: Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown and Dallas Cowboys’ retired running back Emmitt Smith. Using the presumption that star athletes always get better treatment than the rest of us, Geico’s narrator swoops in with the kicker: “You’re not AJ Brown [or Emmitt Smith], but we’ll treat you like him. It feels good to get the star treatment. It feels good to Geico.”
A third spot depicts a man tossing pocket change into a fountain, ending with the line: “It feels good to save some coin. It feels good to Geico.”
And lest consumers worry about whether Geico’s spokeslizard has lost his job, the bright green reptile with a British accent stars in his own spot, in which he points out that “it feels good to be heard. It feels good to Geico.”
This latest slogan, however, begs the same question that its predecessor did: Why scrap “Fifteen minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance”—which ran for about two decades—if it was among the best-known tag lines in advertising?
As Insurance Information Institute’s Robert Hartwig told ADWEEK in 2007, that popular slogan had “worked its way into the vernacular. The whole marketing for Geico has become part of [everyone’s] consciousness when it comes to insurance.”
But after Geico had sufficiently hammered home its point about saving money, it was only logical to expand its messaging to touch on personalized customer service—starting with “Real Service, Real Savings” and continuing with the latest slogan.
“The new platform shifts to emotional value built on both connections and relationships,” Geico explained in a prepared statement. “In a category that speaks almost entirely about savings, Geico is focusing on value as something you feel, not something you calculate.”
