Lucid Motors has opened the mystery boxes that began popping up around NYC last week to reveal its upcoming Air sedan. The move is a kickoff to an ad campaign celebrating the recently approved SPAC merger with Churchill Capital Corp. IV (CCIV) to build hype around the flagship EV from Lucid set to deliver sometime this year.

Lucid Motors is by no means new to the EV world. Since being founded in 2007, the company has grown and evolved into a luxury EV automaker, just recently hitting the radar of the average consumer. The “Dream Edition” version of its flagship EV, the Lucid Air, was originally scheduled to deliver this past spring but is now coming “sometime in the second half of 2021.”

The news of the delay came shortly after Lucid announced its pending business combination with CCIV last February, and completing that IPO has become a huge focus for the automaker since.

With the merger now complete and Lucid Motors trading on the Nasdaq as $LCID, the company has refocused on expanding its pool of potential customers and fans of the brand, beginning in New York.

Last week, Lucid began Tweeting about these large black containers that had popped up around parts of NYC, including Hudson Yards, Madison Park, and the Financial District.

The internet immediately began pow-wowing about what these boxes could mean – Is it a VR experience? Is it a new EV announcement? Is it Detective David Mills’ wife’s head?

Following the opening of the boxes in NYC on Sunday, we now know this is part of a new campaign from Lucid Motors around its Air sedan.

Lucid Motors showcases Air sedan in NYC as part of large campaign

As first reported by Ad Age, Lucid’s NYC mystery box stunt is all part of a much larger campaign to promote the Air sedan, following the approved merger with CCIV.

The American automaker removed the sides of the large black containers on Sunday to reveal its Air sedans encased in glass for all to peruse.

As an additional part of the campaign, Lucid Motors took out full page ads in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal to not only celebrate its public listing in NYC, but also promote the Air.

This “unboxing” may come as less of a surprise for any NYC residents who got to see the mystery boxes close up. Before the jewel boxes holding the Airs were unveiled, passersby could peek in and scan a QR code, leading them to a video of drive footage of the upcoming Air sedan.

Lucid’s next focus will be to continue to spread the word about its zero-emission luxury Air EV and its advertised 500 miles of range on a single charge. Their biggest hurdle now will be convincing those consumers to pay $70,000 to $170,000 for that kind of luxury.

As of right now, we are still waiting (patiently) for a concrete delivery window on the Dream Edition Air.

Electrek‘s take

WHAT’S IN THE BOX?!? I’ve been screaming that question into the void of my laptop screen all week and finally got my answer — it’s the Air. It’s not that I’m disappointed at the news; I was simply hoping there was a little more to it than that.

If you couldn’t tell by the pressing effort last week from from Lucid and CCIV to rally shareholders into voting to approve the merger, the automaker has been very occupied with this pending vote since February. It is now approved, however, and we can all refocus on the more exciting stuff — new EVs.

Lucid’s VP of marketing briefly touched on this, but it’s important to point out Lucid’s marketing strategy here.

The boxes and full page ads aren’t necessarily new tactics in garnering curiosity and fandom. However, Lucid’s IPO and the audience it’s promoting to represent a new group of people: those not solely engulfed in Wall Street and finances, but not simply everyday consumers buying a new vehicle.

These individuals may have done their homework in their spare time outside of their non-Wall St. jobs and own Lucid stock on apps Robinhood or WeBull.

All in all, this IPO isn’t just a celebration for the company and is no longer just for those savvy traders on the floor of the NYSE. With more everyday consumers educating themselves and buying in on companies like Lucid, this merger has become just as much of a cultural movement as it is a financial one.

Lucid appears to have anticipated this and has had the foresight to steer this momentum into an ad campaign. As a result, it hopes to transfer the hype around the company itself into fanfare for deliveries of its first upcoming EV… whenever that may be…

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