Kia Celebrity Cars

NBA players are a valuable marketing resource with consumer reach as far as a full-court shot. That’s why when LeBron James approached Kia for with the idea of an endorsing deal, Kia took notice. The end result is a deal between the two, or more specifically, James and the Kia K900.

Apparently James had the chance to drive around all summer in the K900 and ended up loving the car. ESPN reports James posted a picture of the car on Instagram with captions reading, “Rolling in my K900. Love this car!!”

Tim Chaney, Kia’s vice president of marketing told ESPN.com, “We were not actively seeking another endorser, but LeBron told us, after driving the car around this summer, that he like it so much, that we decided to partner with him. He brought us instant credibility."

James said in a statement regarding the collaboration, “For me, a partnership has to be authentic and real to who I am and that’s what makes this one so special."

While the details of the multiyear, multimillion-dollar deal have not been disclosed, sources say James must show up at Cavaliers games in the K900 and will appear in several TV commercials. Thankfully for LeBron, the deal does not restrict him from driving other vehicles in his 20-car fleet, which includes the likes of Lamborghini, Ferrari, Porsche, Maybach, and Rolls Royce.

While Kia isn’t expecting the deal to create clamoring crowd of K900 buyers, the Korean automaker does expect the endorsement deal to have a positive impact on the brand’s public perception as a viable luxury automaker.

Click past the jump to read more about the Kia K900.

Who’s the next star showcasing in Top Gear’s "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car"? Well, according to The Sun, it’s none other than Days of Thunder star, Tom Cruise and his Knight and Day co-star, Cameron Diaz. THese two are said to be taking a lap around the Top Gear track in a Kia c’eed in hopes of getting on top of the leader board. Apparently Cruise and Diaz were in Britain for the premiere of their new movie Knight and Day when Cruise’s "people" gave Top Gear a call.

A Top Gear source is the root of this story and he says, "Tom knew we were filming so asked if he could give the old Kia a whirl.

"Cameron was up for it too so we’re getting two A-list stars for one show. Jeremy Clarkson and the boys couldn’t be happier."

The Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz edition of "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" is said to be airing as soon as this Sunday so make sure you keep your eyes and ears open to catch these two stars whipping it around the track.

Top Gear’s 15th season kicked off in the UK last week and as we have come to expect from those fellas, well, we really don’t know what to expect from them because unpredictability has always been their calling card. This season figures to be no different.

That being said, one popular segment that looks like it’s going to continue for Season no.15 is the "Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car" and Top Gear, in an attempt to get something a little more up-to-date than the Chevy Lacetti they’ve been prancing around with in past seasons, is gearing up - no pun intended - to debut a new car for celebrity guests to punch in their best lap times on the Top Gear race track.

And during the first episode of the 15th season, we finally caught a glimpse of what the new reasonably-priced car is, and as fate would have it, that car turned out to be none other than Kia’s affable Cee’d, a car that, incidentally, isn’t available in America.

Whether Top Gear’s celebrity guests will have as good a time behind the wheel of the Cee’d as they did with the Lacetti, and the even older Suzuki Liana, remains to be seen. But what we do know is Top Gear’s back, which means its time for season downloads to resume.

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