The Environmental Protection Agency sets fuel-economy rules. Honda insists its ad meets all legal and ethical challenges. It's not something we didn't discuss and consider. But we thought adding the qualifier was sufficient. Certainly, the Lupo gets better mileage, but it's a diesel, and nobody's heard of the Lupo here.
Experts agree the ad is likely to get the message across.
But they disagree whether that makes it misleading or just good, tough advertising. Obviously, they're weaseling a little bit, but they're doing it very well, and nobody will get the weasel. I think it's smart. A screenful of small print typical of car-leasing ads does raise a flag to consumers, he says. But even those almost never get across the specifics, his research shows.