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Video: 'I Love My City,' Detroit Slow Roll Leader Says in National TV Ad

August 15, 2014, 5:13 PM by  Alan Stamm

Time for sunny news at the end of a week that began soggily: This new national TV spot shows a successful young Detroit who's not a rapper, athlete, watchmaker or Corktown restaurant owner.

He's Slow Roll bike group co-founder Jason Hall, spotlighted by Apple as an innovator whose iPad is a daily efficiency tool.


Jason Hall: "I wanted to convince other people to see Detroit the way I was seeing it.” (Photos by Apple, Inc.)

The one-minute ad above, first aired this week on "The Daily Show," and a sizable online profile with 13 photos tells how the two-wheel tour D'etroit each Monday evening expanded from a dozen friends into a biking brigade with hundreds of riders. Hall tells how he plans and promotes it via his iPad -- and why the ride is about more than recreation.

Slow Roll encourages people from all walks of life to explore the many sides of Detroit. . . . Slow Roll isn’t a race — it’s an easy ride with a different route every week, celebrating Detroit’s rich history and new developments. . . . 

“I started Slow Roll to show Detroit in a positive light love my city and I wanted to help other people love it again. . .

"I wanted to convince other people to see Detroit the way I was seeing it,” he says. “The plan was, let’s start a bike ride and see if people want to go with us.” . . .

Through Slow Roll, he's helping his neighbors reconnect with the place they call home. . . . "Slow Roll has transcended your typical bike ride. We're changing lives. It's affecting people in a real way, and it's changing people's perceptions."

Speaking of perceptions, the commercial also has a positive impact by showing the city without clichés. "Wow! A national Detroit ad that isn't focused on ruin porn," former Free Press columnist Desiree ("Detroit Snob") Cooper  posted Thursday on Facebook.

"Jason Hall is the perfect ambassador for . . . our city," local adman Charlie Wollborg posts at the same site.  

As a new Apple ambassador,  Hall soon will make paid visits to stores in Washington, D.C., Chicago and Portland -- though not by bike.  


Jason Hall, at center in black helmet and red sneakers, co-founded Slow Roll in 2010. Rides now regularly draw more than 1,000 participants.


Read more:  YouTube


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