In 2025, we have seen U.S. automakers begin to incorporate “Made In America” claims into their video ads in response to Trump administration policies to onshore industrial production. Ford, Honda, Toyota, Hyundai, and Stellantis (which produces Jeep and Ram) all released ads with increased patriotic themes, emphasizing American production facilities, seemingly in response to the current political environment and White House messaging.
These claims include Ford’s “From America. For America” tagline and Jeep describing itself as “America’s most patriotic brand.” Response to these ads was mixed, perhaps unsurprisingly. President Trump praised Ford’s ad on Truth Social, while consumer advocacy group Truth in Advertising criticized Stellantis for exaggerating how much of its manufacturing occurs in the U.S. The latter moment prompted Stellantis to quickly pull its trio of Jeep, Dodge, and Ram ads from social platforms.
Amid the controversy and praise around this automaker advertising trend, our team at Swayable wanted to answer a key question: how does “Made in America” messaging actually impact consumer sentiment for these popular car brands? To uncover how persuasive—or divisive—these ads could be, we surveyed more than 2,800 people who may be in the market for these types of cars: a wide range of consumers from varying economic backgrounds, regions, and political ideologies.
Key takeaways from the survey results included:
- Credibility and likability aren’t interchangeable: while “Made in America” ads from automakers were widely seen as credible and informative, they didn’t significantly boost likability or make the brands seem more competitive.
- Subtle American-made themes performed well: ads that struck a balance between national pride and broader stories—like Honda’s mix of brand history and future optimism—performed better across key metrics like relevancy, credibility, and authenticity, especially among liberal and moderate audiences.
- Demographics shape how certain ads land: reactions to “Made in America” messaging varied widely by political ideology, income, and region. Very conservative demos responded most positively to Jeep’s ad appealing to bold patriotic themes, while very liberal audiences preferred Honda’s more balanced messaging.
Keep scrolling for a deep dive into what we uncovered.
Credibility ≠ likability
To better understand people’s attitudes toward “Made in America” messaging, Swayable asked survey respondents questions about five video ads from Jeep, Ford, Hyundai, Honda, and Toyota, which all positioned the brands as being proudly manufactured in America.
The survey measured 26 direct reactions to the content, gauging metrics such as relevancy, memorability, NPS, and whether the content was credible and informative. Overall, we found that these “Made In America” ads didn’t have an adverse effect on people’s perceptions of the brands. However, across certain metric categories, there were some notable shifts in people’s attitudes toward ads appealing to patriotic themes.
The most notable lift scores were around the ads being credible and informative. When asked whether the content was credible and informative, from a scale of “no” to “definitely”, the average lift skewed positive with ranges from 70.3 (Ford and Hyundai) to 72.9 (Honda) for the credible metric, and ranges from 70.6 (Ford) to 73.8 (Honda) for the informative metric.
On the opposite end, the metric categories that generated the lowest lift scores were likability and competitive advantage. When asked, “Overall, how much do you like this ad?” responses struck the middle of “Very much like” and “Very much dislike,” with Ford and Toyota garnering the lowest scores at 52.8 and 55.5, respectively. At the same time, when asked “How does this brand compare to other car brands,” responses towed the line between “much better” and “much worse,” with Ford, Jeep, and Hyundai all scoring in the low 50s.
Juxtaposing these metric categories spotlights a common throughline of how consumers felt about these ads. The majority of respondents found the ads to be credible and informative, suggesting the ads were high quality. However, this didn’t translate to people enjoying the ads or finding that they gave the brands a competitive edge. Consumers may understand and acknowledge the claims of being American-made, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they enjoyed or were excited by the actual content.
Different ad themes impact different metrics
While every ad focused on the “Made In America” theme broadly, brands took varying approaches to their creative and claims. After digging deeper into the survey results within key metric categories, it became clear that certain approaches resonated with consumers better than others.
Honda and Jeep took similar approaches by kicking off their ads with a focus on the American history of their brands; the former then presented a “hope for the future” theme without overly leaning into American-made themes, while the latter highlighted “freedom of choice pricing” and the claim of being “America’s most patriotic brand.”
Honda outperformed Jeep across key metrics such as relevancy, credibility, shareability, and authenticity. However, Jeep outperformed Honda in one key category: memorability. Honda’s subtler American-made messaging seemed to have resonated better overall, but Jeep’s bolder claims and focus on American identity helped the brand stand out.
Meanwhile, Ford, Toyota, and Hyundai created ads that were less about their brand history and more about being committed to America, creating jobs for Americans, and the number of manufacturing plants across the U.S. The ad visuals opted for practicality over style, focusing on the people employed by the brands or using their vehicles.
There wasn’t one single ad that dominated across key metrics, with each generating higher or lower scores depending on the category:
- Hyundai generated the highest numbers in relevancy and being informative, suggesting that people were receptive to its claims of putting people first and affordability.
- Toyota scored highest in the credibility category, likely due to claims of specific numbers of manufacturing plants and jobs the brand has created for Americans.
- Ford outperformed in the “U.S. values” category, which measured people’s responses to the question of “How much did the ad emphasize that the vehicle is connected to U.S. values or identity?” This suggests that leaning into messages of being committed to America, claims about high U.S. employment and vehicle production—but not mentioning actual numbers—was most the most effective approach.
Performance varies across political identities, region, and income
Overall, the survey data tells us that the “Made In America” theme didn’t inversely impact the perception of these popular car brands. People found these ads to be mostly credible and informative, while not exactly likable or standing out competitively. But did these overall lift scores vary based on different demographics?
The results breakdown by political identities, age ranges, and income painted a picture of how different ad themes influence different types of consumers:
- The very conservative demographic responded well to ads appealing to patriotic themes: Jeep’s ad drew the highest scores among the very conservative demographic, with scores including 72.1 for credibility, 72.9 for informative, and 73.6 for U.S. values. Each ad also performed the best with this demographic in the U.S. values category.
- Honda’s ad, which didn’t overtly lean into patriotic themes, drew the highest numbers among the very liberal demographic, with scores including 70.9 for relevancy, 73.9 for credibility, and 74.9 for informative—suggesting that the opposite end of the political spectrum appreciated the ad that leaned into a combination of historical and hopeful.
- Across regional splits, Honda’s ad drove the highest scores for relevancy, credibility, and informative among people in the Northeast and South. Toyota’s ad drove the highest scores for people in the West, while Jeep saw the highest performance among people in the Midwest.
- Across annual household income splits, those who make more than $100,000 responded more positively to the ads than those who make between $40,000-$80,000 or less. This suggests that the attitudes of those in the market to buy a new car from these brands weren’t negatively impacted by “Made In America” messaging.
The qualitative answers we gleaned from the survey, particularly to the question of “In your view, how effective is this type of messaging—focusing on national identity, values, and domestic production—in today’s climate?” also pointed to positive to mixed reception, with Honda generating the most positive responses (53%) and Toyota generating the most negative responses (35%).
The survey results tell us that for popular car brands, leaning into “Made in America” themes in today’s political environment won’t necessarily deter U.S. consumers or change their brand perception. Overall, the most well-received ads are grounded in historical facts, feature themes of hope and improving the economy, and are supported by visuals of real people working and driving.
Looking to quickly test and confirm whether your messaging will sway consumers? Book a demo with Swayable today.
Methodology:
This survey experiment was conducted on Swayable over 24 hours between June 5-6 with responses from 2,828 U.S. consumers aged 18+. Questions were asked of a general population sample aged 18+ using Swayable’s proprietary online platform.
The sample frame is U.S. smartphone users in all 50 states with active internet connections who are users of popular mobile and web apps that make up Swayable’s network of respondent partners. Respondents are solicited from partner apps with non-monetary reward offers for their participation. Respondents were recruited with an approximately even ratio of men and women imposed via separate quotas for each. This is a “non-probability sample” (in the conventional terminology of public opinion research, although this team believes this concept is not meaningful since truly random sampling of the population is not possible via any methodology). To correct for over/under-sampling, all samples are post-stratified to the general U.S. population using cross-tabulations accounting for factors including age, ethnicity, gender, educational attainment, and geography, based on the latest available data from the U.S. Census Bureau and Swayable’s proprietary population modeling. Margins of error quoted are based on response distribution statistics and sample sizes and are calculated independently for each result.
This research was conducted and self-funded by Swayable.