Will the Adams Family tractor business gain traction after Super Bowl ad airs?

Images of Google, Doritos and Bud Light are what most folks conjure when thinking Super Bowl commercials. Local ads, however, are sprinkled in each year.

Dayne Kuhlmann, the President of Victory Media, has a concept he believes will grab attention from the corporate heavyweights.

Victory Media shot a spot for Sunday focusing on Adams Tractor, which has shops in Spokane, Coeur d’Alene, Colfax, Lewiston and Bonners Ferry, Idaho. The family-owned business, which has been selling new and used tractors and farm equipment since 1929, gets the up-close-and-personal treatment during Super Bowl LVII.

“What’s crazy to me is that some companies buy time for a local commercial for the Super Bowl and they just play their normal commercial,” Kuhlmann said. “I said, ‘Let’s do something that people will notice.’ I wanted to make a commercial that will cause people to say, ‘What did I just watch?’ ”

The Adams Tractor concept is clever. It’s a mockumentary of a documentary that doesn’t exist. Adams Tractor is portrayed as a storied championship institution and features a number of local luminaries, starting with Washington NFL icon Mark Rypien. The Spokane resident won a Super Bowl and was MVP of Super Bowl XXVI.

“Mark is hilarious,” Kuhlmann said. “Just wait until you see him.”

Rypien chuckled when he recalled the experience. “I had such a great time hanging out at Hudson’s Burgers,” Rypien said while calling from a fundraiser at a Phoenix bowling alley while in town for the Super Bowl. “They let an amateur like me ham it up in front of a camera. I had a great time and I enjoyed doing it since I’ve known the Addams family for years. They’re good people and I met some new friends while working on the commercial.”

Gonzaga guard Rasir Bolton; Boomer, the Spokane Chiefs’ mascot; Chandler Baird of Spokane Eats; and Rick Clark of Giving Back Packs are part of the commercial.

“I just thought I would be in the background,” Clark said. “But I got a speaking part with the owner, John. It was an awesome experience. When I left, I joked by saying, ‘I’m going to a soap opera audition now.’ ”

The spot was shot over a 16-hour day at Adams Tractor and Hudson Burgers in Coeur d’Alene and on a farm in Rathdrum.

“We had a great deal of fun after putting in so much work on this project,” Kuhlmann said. “We wanted this to be the most star-studded Spokane commercial, and we wanted it to be unique.”

The icing on the cake is that the 30-second commercial leads to a 4-minute short. The clip will include a website, www.tractoru.film, viewers can jump to after catching the advertisement. The Adams campaign will run for six weeks.

“There is such a rich history with Adams Tractor,” Kuhlmann said. “Henry Ford met John Adams’ grandfather when Ford was coming through during the World’s Fair. Ford met John’s grandfather on the train tracks and made a deal with him to sell tractors.”

Nearly a century later, the Adams family is still in the game selling top-of-the-line Kubotas.

The project isn’t the first with Victory Media and Adams Tractor. Three years ago, a spot was shot featuring Kuhlmann’s then-6-year-old daughter shopping for a Kubota. The adult version of Kuhlmann’s daughter, played by his wife, bought the tractor.

It’s a cute commercial, but the latest Victory Media/Adams project is much more ambitious.

“We wanted to make something special, and we’re excited about it,” Kuhlmann said. “We can’t wait to see what people think of it. We wanted to make something great.”

That makes sense, since a Super Bowl commercial costs a lot of dollars.

“I can’t say how much the commercial is, but it was expensive,” Kuhlmann said. “But I’m sure it will be worth it.”