Hyundai Makes Super Bowl Ad Buy

The Hyundai Motor Co. will take out five television spots before and during the Feb. 5 Super Bowl game in an effort to help bolster its rising brand recognition and continue big sales gains from the past few years.

John Krafcik, Hyundai’s North American chief executive, says the fast-growing brand is working on a 60-second spot that will run right before kickoff, as well as two ads on the pregame show and two during the first and third quarters of the game.

He would not specify how much the Korean automaker is spending on the ads, which will compete with the most creative spots American companies have to offer during one of television’s highest-rated and most expensive sporting events. Last year Super Bowl ads cost companies about $3 million for 30 seconds.

Chrysler’s two-minute spot featuring the rapper Eminem was among those that received the most Super Bowl attention last year, and it helped begin what has been a strong sales year for the recovering company.

Mr. Krafcik said Hyundai hoped to have standout spots as well, but it would focus more on a brand message rather than going for entertainment value.

“We’re competing with Doritos and Pepsi and Anheuser-Busch,” he said Friday at an auto show briefing at a technical center near Ann Arbor, Mich. “Those are tough competitors from an entertainment point of view.”

Hyundai sells the Elantra compact, Sonata midsize car and Tucson crossover S.U.V., among other models.

Hyundai has had huge sales growth in a lackluster American auto market. Through October, the company has sold more than 545,000 vehicles, already passing last year’s record sales of 538,000, according to the Autodata Corporation.

Hyundai’s sales are so strong that it is having trouble supplying cars and crossovers to its dealers, Mr. Krafcik said. It has raised the annual output at its factory in Montgomery, Ala., to around 330,000 this year, and will produce more cars in North America in 2012, he said.