Model trains in this one 
Ralph
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zbXarZtgJo&feature=share[/youtube]
Wow! That’s exactly how my railroad operates… Coincidence???
-Kevin
Cool!
Way cool… Do ya think that maybe Pixar might have a little to do with that?
While I enjoy the commercials (Hey, train guy here!) I must confess I do not understand what benefit they offer NS. It’s not like I’m going to see the commercial and think “Hey, I’ll ship Aunt Donna’s package by train”! Those who need to ship large volumes are already well aware of the freight services available. Again, glad they do it, just not sure where the value is for them.
Its more of a public relations thing. Railroads found that the public started to get more and more negative towards trains in general. Most people these days think, "great the train is going to make me late for … " or something like that. There also is a misconception that trains are gas hogs and are not good for the environment.
The railroads do need a favorable public opinion and so they started an ad campaign to educate the public on what it is that railroads really do. TBH, it isnt different from what has been done in the past. Many of us have seen the promotional videos of the past. This is just another form of that.
I understand PR, I just don’t see any but the smallest of benifit to NS. Outside of my train friends I never hear anyone discuss railroads, or even trains in general. When they do, it’s pretty much about “light rail” and how much they like it (or hate paying taxes for it). Of course being public, it could be as much about “investor relations” as “Public Relations”.
Either way, they are honestly the only commercials I pay any attention to!
Yeah its a nice PR piece, there is a commercial that gets shown out here by GE talking about their locomotives like new cars, now of course no one is going to rush out to their local GE locomotive dealer and buy a shiny new Dash-9 with leather seats Mp3 and whitewall tires to make the next door neighbor envious of the bright new Diesel parked in your driveway, but its a way of saying “Hey were here” and to target possible investors. I’ve seen mostly UP commercials here, some BNSF, even a couple NS commercials here also, usually during TV shows with national feeds.
The question no has asked is who’s model trains were those in the commercial? Methinks Lionel or MTH O
Dash-9’s come with leather seating???
Well now I am going to have to reconsider that new CTS!
Wasn’t it CSX that was doing the commercial of how railroads keep trucks off of highways and out of traffic? The big “greeny thing” of a tree taking containers off the highways and putting them on TOFC’s to show how they are saving the environment.
Very cool vid!
Victor Smith said:
Yeah its a nice PR piece, there is a commercial that gets shown out here by GE talking about their locomotives like new cars, now of course no one is going to rush out to their local GE locomotive dealer and buy a shiny new Dash-9 with leather seats Mp3 and whitewall tires to make the next door neighbor envious of the bright new Diesel parked in your driveway, but its a way of saying “Hey were here” and to target possible investors. I’ve seen mostly UP commercials here, some BNSF, even a couple NS commercials here also, usually during TV shows with national feeds. The question no has asked is who’s model trains were those in the commercial? Methinks Lionel or MTH O
I would say that is AtlasO.
(http://www.atlaso.com/images/gp60/1270-1.jpg)
Its even the same road number.
The “Tree-Modal” commercial was another of NS’s endeavors.
http://www.nscorp.com/nscportal/nscorp/Media/TV-Video/
No different then the CP version a few years back…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWwAbdXLql0
Okay maybe a little different, but better