more on the TT commercial

[Jouko Haapanen]

the following from Automotive News:

NEW YORK -- Audi has launched a TV campaign with the tag line "Great then.
Great now" to underline its claim to have been first to market with
all-wheel-drive passenger cars.

Len Hunt, Audi of America vice president, said the German automaker wants to
counter a growing number of luxury-car rivals that offer all-wheel drive.
Most of the cars Audi sells in the United States are equipped with Audi's
quattro awd system.

"Quattro has been nibbled away at -- (the Jaguar) X-Type with all-wheel
drive; BMW with all-wheel drive; Mercedes with all-wheel drive. We thought
we would remind people who invented this," he said at a press conference
here April 10.

Audi unveiled the first quattro system at the Geneva auto show in 1980, and
the Audi 80 quattro debuted in 1982.

For the record, Subaru of America Inc. says it launched the first four-wheel
drive station wagon in 1974.

Audi's once-exclusive preserve has become crowded.

Among its European competitors, Jaguar introduced the X-Type, the first
Jaguar with awd as standard equipment, at the New York auto show
April 11.

Mercedes-Benz USA Inc. introduced a new version of its 4Matic
all-wheel-drive system in 1997, closely related to the system in the M-class
sport-utility.

And BMW of North America Inc. dropped awd in the early 1990s but
reintroduced awd versions of the 3 series in September 2000.

Race driver Michele Mouton provides the voiceover for Audi's new ad.

"Twenty years ago, Audi turned the racing world upside down," she says with
a strong French accent. "First, by introducing an all-wheel-drive rally car.
Then, by putting a woman behind the wheel."

In an aerial view, her race car disappears behind some foliage, and a new TT
emerges with the tagline, "Great then. Great now."

According to Audi, Mouton in 1981 was the first - and so far, only - woman
to win a World Rally Championship event.

The ad started airing this month and is expected to run through the end of
the year, said Audi spokeswoman Jennifer Garber. Audi also created two print
ads that emphasize Audi's motorsports heritage, she said.

Audi's ad agency is McKinney & Silver of Raleigh, N.C.