I’m usually open to creative and/or obscure humor. But this is just one big fat failure. I can’t see how they plan to increase sales by sending out references to “muff diving.” In case you don’t know what that is, ask your frat boy buddy. Definitely do not ask your mom.
Maybe Spirit Air knows I’m in their 26-32 male demographic and focus groups have told them 26-32 males looking for deals find muff diving jokes funny. Maybe they’re trying to get negative attention in the media by offending people in order to spread their brand and hope people stumble on over to their website to see how cheap their fares are. Maybe their advertising budget is so small they had to hire your frat boy buddy to write their ads. I don’t know.
In case you’re wondering, MUFF is not a long-lost airport code. It stands for “many unbelievably fantastic fares.” But nobody will figure that out because they’ll ignore the email after reading the subject line.
I raised an eyebrow this morning when I read this, and I wanted to share. Comments appreciated.
Comments
This campaign is genius. It got me to not only open the email (which I usually ignore) but forward it to a bunch of friends and post on my facebook. I also searched and found this blog.
I would call that entirely effective.
by Shane thinks you fail on February 02, 2010 at 4:19 pm
I admit that I find this a bit clever. While the actual joke is crass, it certainly does have people talking (and googling and forwarding and, obviously, laying eyes on the Spirit logo, etc). While I don’t know that this will actually sell any tickets, it probably will make a lot more people aware that the airline exists in the first place. Maybe they’ll lose their more easily offended customers, but maybe they’ll gain the ones who like sneakily placed jokes about women’s vaginas. Like you said- who knows?
by Emily on February 02, 2010 at 9:28 pm
This ad is effective if people like Shane buy tickets. But if Shane forwards it, shares it on Facebook and tells everyone he knows but none of them buy tickets--and, meanwhile, long-time ticket buyers like Cari are put off and buy less tickets--then the ad is a failure. I hope they did their research.
by Sean McCambridge on February 02, 2010 at 9:42 pm
I appreciate your feedback. Comments are moderated. Email is required but won't be printed. Include your website if you have one.
The Marketing tag line, “MUFF to DIVING,” is HIGHLY offensive and many customers will reject this type of language.
Spirit might want to reconsider their marketing team and creative personnel. I doubt that the Spirit staff are that naively unaware of what those words imply but i think it is in very bad taste. Spirit is running an AIRLINE not a dirty magazine. I would normally not be concerned with this language in a XXX rated magazine, book, or movie, but an Airline? I assume “traveling” can be a family affair, and this language is not appropriate. Plus traveling in an Aircraft has become a serious event in today’s society and seriousness and safety should be implied. Not teenage boy comedy.
This is disgusting and i hope Spirit will hear more about this…
by Cari on February 02, 2010 at 4:54 pm