Not sure Clark Gable and Yoko One resonate with Anyone nowadays ... and Lennon ... some folks have probably heard of him ... Jackie O?

Sharon Stone .. . some folks might know. Clooney and Bradd Pitt, recognizable----but doe s anyone Identify with them?

Obama---sort of polarizing. The young-middle Beatles? No one knows or cares. I don't recognize the r4est.

Better that way because it is easier to identify with a nameless model than a celebrity ... but those photos, as Jim from west of Nantasket says, at least Approach the kind of the stuff the OP was describing---they are Not aimed at people already in the "Bicycling Lifestyle," but at people outside of that. You don't get new customers from advertising to old customers. The idea with that sort of photo array is to reach people who Don't ready Bicycling Magazine or even know what a crank set is.

I know nobody here wants to talk about what the OP started discussing ... but the OP was talking about a New market, not deeper penetration into existing markets. I'd say the normal channels are clogged and saturated with every type of advertisement---they pop up on this site all the time, in my inbox all the time, on every other site I visit .... I don't read the magazines because they are nothing but advertisements.

The photos above at least send the message, "People don't have to get sweaty and dirty or know mechanics or wear funny clothes to have a great time riding a bike." The OP believes there is an untapped market, and everyone else is talking about how to reach people who have already bought half-a-dozen bicycles ... in other words a tapped-out market.

That is the fundamental difference between the original meaning of the thread and many others have decided to discuss ... OP is talking about not a new type of advertising but a new market for that advertising.

We all complain about how the bike companies come out with "New!!!!" stuff regularly, whether it is needed or not, just to get people to buy even more bikes, to own the latest and greatest. We see the mags and sites pushing all the gear, selling jerseys like fashion, doing anything they can to squeeze a few more pennies out of an oversold market.

The OP was suggesting a strategy designed to reach a New, Untapped market. When you buy a McDonald's franchise, sure, you can build it right int eh middle of a cluster of fast-food restaurants, figuring that you will get one of six customers as they rotate through the five other outlets and then yours ... or you can go to some place where there is no competition and be the only one. You might not get rich ... but you have an untapped market, not a jaded market. You won't be fighting hard for crumbs.

I think in America that market is not that large and cannot be manufactured, because of urban design and lacking infrastructure. But one can see where daily transport cycling works well in many other cultures. Can't blame people for wanting to find ways to bring it here..