In a new low in ghoulish marketing, an ad agency in India has used the shooting of Malala Yousafzai to sell mattresses.
Since the theme of the print campaign for Kurl-On mattresses is “bounce back,” a cartoon image of the young Pakistani activist being shot in the face by the Taliban and recovering to win a humanitarian award makes sense, right?
Don’t worry, no one else gets it either.
[seealso slug="marketing-wins-fails-2013"]
Ogilvy & Mather India, the agency responsible, has launched an internal investigation and apologized, saying, “We deeply regret this incident…and will take whatever corrective action is necessary.”
We would like to apologize to Malala Yousafzai and her family. Our official statement can be found here. http://t.co/DgGPz6gK33
— Ogilvy & Mather (@Ogilvy) May 15, 2014
The ad is part of a series that also depicts Steve Jobs being ousted and returning to Apple and Mahatma Gandhi getting thrown off a train and rising as a spiritual leader. Anyone could argue, at the very least, that those are misappropriations of famous faces and extraordinary accomplishments for the sake of shilling product. That’s an advertising misstep not without precedent.
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Post by Ads of the World.
But the ad with Yousafzai, basically re-enacting the attack on the schoolgirl, complete with AK-47 and blood spatter, has spawned a steady stream of outraged comments on Twitter, Facebook, blogs and other digital media. “Tasteless, crass and obscene” are among the printable reactions.
Brands that pull from the headlines or link their marketing with current events have often found themselves in hot water, whether it’s Kenneth Cole using the Syrian conflict to hawk shoes or Spirit Airlines mocking the NFL bullying scandal to peddle cheap flights.