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Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. Inc.'s Lexus luxury brand has placed its first ad in a publication targeted at gay consumers, The Advocate, a Lexus spokesman tells Ward's.

Brian Bolain, Lexus national advertising and marketing manager, declined to be interviewed. But he told the website commercialcloset.org the proclivity toward luxury purchases by gay buyers led Lexus to place the ad.

“Being gay myself, I'm aware of how critical the market and its income are,” he tells the online publication. “I've got all that hardwired into me. There's a predisposition in our community towards luxury goods, so why shouldn't Lexus be among them?”

Up to now, few Japanese auto makers, with the exception of Subaru and, more recently, Toyota's youth-oriented Scion brand, have marketed themselves to the gay community, at least in the U.S.

However, Lexus' chief competitors, including DaimlerChrysler AG's Mercedes-Benz brand, General Motors Corp.'s Cadillac marque and several of Ford Motor Co.'s Premier Automotive Group luxury brands, have pitched their vehicles to gay buyers.