AirNZ - you disgust me

As in actually disgusts me.

I understand it's April Fool's Day and you guys are all about trying to be clever and forward thinking and someone has told you that the Rico thing was a good idea, but whoever told you that this was a good idea is a fucking moron.

Grab a Seat had a special promo on 'today':

You select male or female, enter you age and then enter your weight, giving you your cost for a seat. As you increase the weight, the person expands filling up more and more of the 3 person seat. Hit Calculate and you end up here:

Brilliant. This one is not as bad as I entered Male and 89kgs, but when I put in my weight it basically told me that I was a lard arse. Awesome. Thanks very much. I actually prefer the term 'cuddly' to lard arse. There is some positive brand association right there.

I actually think that The Real Steve Grey sums the whole thing up best, but you can read that over at his blog here rather than me retelling his story.

I was offended. I thought it was an awful, unfunny promotion and so, as I do, I tweeted about it:

Do you think I go any response from AirNZ. Of course not. Way to use twitter as a broadcast medium Air NZ instead of having a conversation with your customers. You're kinda missing the point.

In the afternoon they sent out this tweet:

I can only assume I am not the only one that was not impressed. In fact, the response from my followers who replied to me made it obvious that I was not the only one.

Between this and the Rico bullshit that they have been putting out the damage that they have done to this brand in my eyes currently is irreparable. I will be avoiding AirNZ at all costs.

Oh, what also doesn't help the cause, is when either an AirNZ or agency person starts responding to such complaints on Twitter. Only to me/@tone & one other person, but this doesn't help the situation. In fact, you're making it worse. Honestly, what were you thinking?