Episode 836: The Rational Madness Of The Used Car Salesman : Planet Money Why are used car commercials so annoying? Meet the original sinner.

Episode 836: The Rational Madness Of The Used Car Salesman

Madman Muntz
CBS Television

You know those local car ads? The ones with a dude standing in a parking lot, offering a bunch of special deals, shouting that he's "craaazy?" Well, there's actually a specific person who created this form of on-air hysteria, an originator of the bonkers used car ad.

Today on the show, we collaborate with Gimlet's Every Little Thing, and go in search of the patient zero of annoying car commercials. We find out who started this advertising model, how it spread, and why there may actually be a method to this madness. It sells cars and we figure out why.

Music: Original scoring by Dara Hirsch.

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