Air France lets patrons see what flight can be
Airline wants to take passengers past bare-bones flying
You open what looks like an in-flight care package to find 50 feet of Sudoku puzzles on a tapelike roll, Champagne-flavored gummy candies and a scratch-and-sniff patch that smells like boeuf bourguignon. In a time of low-cost airlines, where your ticket might not include an edible hot meal or free access to electronic entertainment, the box reminds you of what could be if you shell out a little more on Air France.
That’s the idea behind the airline’s new “Take a Chance or Fly Air France” campaign, which will begin showing up in American digital ad space this week.
“We want to remind our clients and our future clients that there is another way to travel, even in economy, where everything is included,” said Dominique Wood, Air France’s executive vice president of brand and communication. “You’ve got a very comfortable seat, you’ve got a hot meal and a full complement of entertainment, and if you can have it — if you’re the right age — a glass of French Champagne.”
The airline is seeing more and more competition, even on its trans-Atlantic routes, from mostly European carriers that advertise rock-bottom fares. (Air France also has its own low-cost option, listed online as a “light” fare, that does not include a checked bag. To keep its base fares more competitive, the airline charges a fee for seat selection on most economy tickets.)
With cheap flights becoming increasingly popular, Air France’s campaign offers an image out of another era. The airline wants to let travelers know that flying does not necessarily have to be a bare-bones experience.
And, Wood said, those ultralow fares are not always as cheap as they seem.
“We are quite convinced that most of the low-cost carrier’s clients don’t know that they pay nearly the same price when they travel with the low-cost company because when they have the luggage, the meal, the drinks, the entertainment, at the end of the day it’s very similar to the all-included price they could pay with Air France,” Wood said. “As we have the image of a quite premium airline, it’s not obvious for them to understand that.”
The Air France campaign will mostly be a digital one, but visitors to the Grove mall in Los Angeles on Saturday can win pairs of round-trip economy tickets. The Sudoku puzzle tape, gummies and scratch-and-sniff patches will also be given away, and will be available in an online sweepstakes.
American low-cost airlines do not compete directly with Air France, but they use some of the same advertising techniques that its less-expensive international competitors do.
“Obviously, we promote our low fares heavily — it’s the price point that will be successful at getting attention,” Tyri Squyres, vice president of marketing at Frontier Airlines, said in an email. “And then we educate customers on all the options they have with us.”
She added: “Our goal is to simply let people get off the couch and go. Our low fares enable more people to travel and do it more often.”