“We think you’re doing great… harm to our planet.” So opens a Wizz Air ad shaming business class passengers and the airlines that cater to them.
Wizz Air Attacks Business Class
I’ve written about the tiff between Wizz Air and legacy carriers in Europe, particularly Lufthansa. After Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr attacked low-cost carriers like Wizz Air for being “ecologically irresponsible”, Wizz Air CEO Jozsef Varadi hit back that “business class should be banned” due its larger carbon footprint.
> Read More: Lufthansa, Our Guardian Of The Environment And Living Wage…
> Read More: Delusional Airline CEO Wants To Ban Business Class
That should have been the end of the tit-for-tat, but Wizz Air has launched another strike via a new ad that again attacks business class on flights under five hours.
You can watch the ad here:
Hey @British_Airways @lufthansa @_austrian We need to talk. #banbusiness #banbusinessclass pic.twitter.com/cEJi9oh9FC
— Wizz Air (@wizzair) December 5, 2019
Note that Wizz Air attacked Austrian, British Airways, and Austrian…three of its biggest competitors.
Wizz Air Ad Makes No Sense
I watched the ad expecting to laugh.
But I didn’t.
I watched the add expecting to at least think a little deeper about my own choice to fly business class, when possible, even on short flights.
But I didn’t.
Instead, I just found myself disgusted by an ad poking fun at people who take taxis instead of Uber Pool or who may have to be gone for more than a few days and cannot stuff their suits and shirts into a backpack.
I realize this ad is all about the shock jock effect, not the message itself, but I cannot recall seeing a more unprofessional airline ad.
Is anyone going to fly Wizz Air because of this ad? I don’t boycott any airline, but I’m sure going to try to find a way to avoid Wizz Air going forward.
This ad is like a political candidate expecting to win by attacking the other side instead of offering real solutions and a bold vision beyond poll-tested superficialities. Wizz Air offers an uncomfortable product with deplorable customer service. Look no further than the hilarious Twitter comments. Wizz Air will not win by attacking the competition. The only way Wizz Air can win is by offering a solid and reliable product. That should be its focus; not a tawdry ad. And it should clean its own house before attacking others…
CONCLUSION
I’ll give Wizz Air credit for getting people talking about it commercials. In the meantime, I’ll continue to fly business class even on intra-European flights…maybe if airlines offered this tall guy some decent legroom behind the curtain, it would not be necessary.
Avoiding Wizz Air makes me think of Matt Damon explaining why he won’t join the NSA in Good Will Hunting.
Analogies always break at some point, but I’m just going to stick to Austrian, British Airways and Lufthansa for my intra-Europe flying needs.
How about you?
(H/T: One Mile at a Time)
“Note that Wizz Air attacked Austrian, British Airways, and Austrian…three of its biggest competitors.”
Oops.
Your reaction is a bit ‘over the top’. There is no compelling reason for anyone to fly business class in Europe. I can understand choosing it on red eye flights coast to coast in the US, Canada or Australia…but not Europe.
The ad’s not that bad: makes a legitimate point, and in any case it’s really reactive to the Lufthansa guy pointing the finger at Wizz.
Well said. Business travel within Europe is dumb.
Check your privilege.
Wizz air isn’t so smart they took my car hire money and didn’t give me a car as I am over 75 so I asked for my money back they didn’t give me it so now 25 of my family who fly UK to Lithuania About 10 times a year each don’t use them anymore
My feeling is they are thinking about something else. There are discussions in Europe about an eco-tax for airlines. And they want to move the discussion from indiscriminate taxation to a stronger hit on the legacies. They would not invest so much behind a tit-for-tat game between CEOs
The biggest carbon impact on the environment are meat eaters, forest fires in amazon and Brazil and having more kids than your fair share. Anyone with more than two kids should be publicly castrated.
“Castrated”?
Ah, the voice of reason.
Your reaction is a bit silly, I love flying business. I love bringing all my stuff, I prefer Uber to the subway when going to the airport. That doesn’t mean it isn’t true that those choices impact the planet, they do. I have stopped using Uber and fly economy under 10 hours. Denying our choices have any impact is silly, denying that comfort has consequences is silly. It does.
This. So much this. Thank you!
When I watched the ad, I thought it was a pretty clear example of “dog whistle” techniques. To me, it’s actual purpose came across, not as trying to change the discourse around business class, but as trying to further the generational war between gen z/younger millennials and boomers (in the non-generational-cohort-specific, “Ok Boomers” sense of boomers). Some of the comparisons they draw aren’t even parallel when taken solely in context of the ad itself, but when considered from the broader generation war context they make perfect sense.
In short, the ad is terrible at doing what it pretends to be doing, but great at triggering specific consumer behaviors in their actual target audience. They even managed to cause it to go viral right away by triggering outrage in the group it pretended to be aimed at, so in that regard it’s an excellent ad…
Well, to be fair, the world made Greta something a headline for ranting about ecological thing, throwing blame without offering any solution. She may not even understand how the world literally works for all the blame she throws. She’s still a kid.
No matter how stupid Greta and her ranting, she got publication.
Why not Wizz wanting the same? Its the attention that matters. Who cares about the message?
What a bunch of hypocrites, but also what a silly marketing ploy.
Having decided to tell all business travellers and frequent flyers to go f*ck themselves… have to wonder if this publicity stunt will backfire. I can’t imagine the “rebellious teenager” demographic is all that lucrative.
Apparently I belong to the age of ‘old school travel’ but I’ll certainly go far out of my way to avoid ever flying them after seeing that ad.
I agree with wizzair… I dont agree with low dumping ticket prices however filling up airplanes full of economy seats is better for the climate. Why would you need to sit in business class. On eu airlines on short flights, Its just an extra middle seat free anyway… Need more legroom, buy an emergency exit… No excuse for I am too long to fit. Crappy food? You are flying, want to eat nice go to a nice restaurant! Lounge acces you can buy in most airports if you want etc… On long flights I can understand but anything below 4 hours orso I believe Business class should dissappear.
Jordi,
If your going to argue that Business class should go away on environmental grounds then where does it end? Should not leisure travel be eliminated completely? Should we not require all ships to once again be wind powered? Shut down cruise lines and hotels. No more air conditioning even in private homes. Lets mandate shared living space on environmental grounds. Where does it end?
Do you really think eliminating a few rows with blocked middle coach seats would result in a significant reduction in flights flown overall?
I think your reaction is actually pretty spot on. Wizz Air has taken what should be a serious subject and thrown a bunch of very obviously bogus facts at it to produce an add that is full of inaccurate and misleading claims. It’s bad enough when airlines use very carefully crafted qualifiers (like global airline) to create bogus subsets that allow them to claim an advantage. But its quite another when they do stuff like this.
You know what this is analogous to? Imagine if Delta made an add that suggested that every single Asian male who flew United would be beaten by the cops and dragged off the airplane. They would of course point to the single data point selectively ignoring everything else around it as evidence. But it would still be utter hogwash.
Or as my favorite United States Army Colonel would say “MULEFRITTERS!!!!”
I feel the same as you. I wasn’t left feeling like I learned something or that I should change my behavior, just that they think all airline passengers are college kids flying to Tenerife or Ibiza who only need a few bikinis and sunglasses, and anyone who packs a few shirts and suits is nuts for not wanting to be seen wearing the same clothes during meetings for three days straight.
Maybe the correct message, but wrong delivery method if you actually want to convert anyone.
For the record: usually, the row at Wizz’s priority lane is 10 times longer than the non-priority, because without priority services, the hand luggage allowance is so strict that even the bikini does not fit.
I am one who fully and wholeheartedly agrees with you. Thank you for taking a stand against this silliness. Even though W6 has innundated my hub (OTP), I actively avoid them because of poor service. Now I’ll feel even better about it.
My main problem is that Wizz does not attack other airlines but the travellers themselves, and their lifestyle. In a quite populist way. Business travellers still travel far more than leisure travellers, and as such, business travellers of course need more comfort. It is not funny at all to fit yourself into a Wizz Air seat every other day.
On the other hand, airlines, who operate business class, usually don’t offer more business class seats than Wizz offers seats with extra legroom, and legacy airlines are optimizing the number of business class seats per flight, according to the demand.
I think, this as is rather an “OK, Boomer” message nothing else. So that those, who can’t afford or don’t want to travel business class for any reason, choose Wizz, because they’re cool for blaming business travellers for their “luxurious” lifestyle.
To put it the other way: Why should I choose seats with extra legroom at Wizz or buy priority services to allow me to bring larger hand luggage? Isn’t it the same? Then Wizz should eliminate its extra services… Aah, so if it makes more money for Wizz, then it’s another question?! I guess, the environment is not so important then.
Satellite data shows+0.13C/decade for the last 40 years since the global warming scare began, that is a non problem. Just another in a long line of leftist causes to rally around, with the only solution offered being more government, more socialism, and less freedom.
So 99% of the world’s scientists ( a profession well-known for their dangerous radicalism) are co-conspirators in this socialist hoax ? Thanks for alerting us…
I agree that the ad is unprofessional (and a bit rude too perhaps) – even more so when directly attacking your competitors, but it’s straight to the point. I believe they could have done it in a different way though.
I flown 30-40 times Wizz, always enjoyed flying new aircrafts. It’s true that I actually never need their extra services, and I tried to fit everything in one backpack. No issues at all. My only complaint is that, understandably, in some cities they fly to less convenient airports.
I flown British a few times within Europe and I was shocked to find out that you actually have the exact same facilities as Wizz but 3-4 times the price: you still have to pay extra for your sandwich and your drop-off bag. Makes no sense to me flying BS then!