With a beautiful woman lying on a bed of rose petals, Air France’s ad in the November 17 Wall Street Journal promises to “surround you with thoughtful details throughout your flight: considerate, personalized service, Champagne, unlimited beverages, newspapers, magazines, and varied appetizing menus.”
Sounds inviting, right? Except that the rose petals are in the shape of an airplane (think chalk outline of murder victim, albeit filled in) in the middle of a green field…looking ominously like the outline of Flight 93 in the field near Shanksville, PA, killing all 44 people on board, among thousands who lost their lives on September 11, 2001.
Yikes…maybe the marketing department should have paid more attention during history class? Be curious to know the response to the ad. I for one am feeling a little afraid.
Those two images certainly merged in my mind when I saw that image: murder victim chalk outline plus downed airliner. u00a0Here’s one American traveler who is not inspired to fly Air France based on this ad. u00a0If AF is looking for more international flyers, they’ll probably want to include more international focus groups.
Thanks, Alan, for your comment.u00a0 You would think it would be matter of course to test the ad on the target market before running it (or to have more diverse teams when looking to market to different segments within a single market–e.g. teams at US agencies looking to market products to different audiences within the US).u00a0