The Aviation Gin Advert is Genius... but as Irresponsible as the Ad it Reacts to.

Little has united the marketing world, and maybe even the wider world in the US, in recent years as much as its admiration for Aviation Gin’s clever ‘sequel’ to the controversial Peloton Christmas advert. Yet much as the ad will rightly be talked about, rightly celebrated by marketers, and included in agency briefs until they’re sick of hearing about it... there’s a dark side to the advert that responsible marketers need to acknowledge. It pushes a joke unnecessarily too far and in doing so positively portrays depressive binge drinking, something against the alcohol industry’s own self-governance regulations, and which would be banned if aired in many countries.

I can fully accept as a marketer, and indeed as a consumer, that it is a fantastic ad. It builds on some other great irreverent work that Ryan Reynolds’ brand has run and is certainly helping them carve out a name in incredibly crowded category. I used to work at Diageo and have a cupboard full of their Tanqueray Gin but have still bought a bottle of Aviation. Their recent work or putting an ad for gin, inside an ad for Ryan’s movie inside an ad for a TV was spot on too.

Reactive and responsive marketing as an idea has haunted many marketers since the Oreo Dunk in the Dark Tweet. This is that very rare example of doing it right - quick enough that it still resonates and isn’t old, but taking enough time about it that the execution is polished, on brand and actually something you’d want consumers to see. Most responsive advertising is throw-away Tweets which get rapidly forgotten (if they’re ever seen) and are not worth the huge effort that goes into being real time. It’s an out the box idea that’s surely hugely commendable. It’s an indulgent nod to the advertising community for sure, but it’s a rare example where ad news has crossed into the mainstream and this response has followed it with vast earned media coverage.

If you’ve been living under a rock let me explain - it’s the response to an advert the expensive exercise bike company Peloton ran in the US. The advert showed a husband giving his wife the bike for Christmas last year, and her documenting herself using it ever since to prove back to him how much she has done. You can interpret it in many ways, but it does have some questionable sexist undertones of why a husband would be buying his perfectly fit wife exercise equipment in the first place - is he saying she’s fat? That she needs more exercise? Or does she love working out and he’s giving her something she genuinely wants/asks for? It’s open to interpretation but a lot of that interpretation was negative and for such a ‘purpose’ driven company that was enough to wipe ￡1 billion off its market value.

Aviation’s genius response was effectively to create a sequel. They cast the same actress in a role which, without directly saying it, clearly implies she has broken up with her damaging ex-husband and is now trying to move on. One of her friends even gets in a clever comment about how well she looks (no doubt thanks to the bike). The advert is largely innocuous enough, it gets in a very on brand OTT comment on how smooth the drink is and her friends make it clear how supported and safe they want her to feel.

Yet the whole thing pushes beyond all that to a cheap & dangerous punchline where the ‘humour’ is the fact that the lady is about to get totally wasted to deal with her issues. She is clearly depressed and barely able to speak, so frankly not a great situation to involve alcohol in at all. Whilst with friends (which is better than the whole thing being alone) she then downs a martini which is a drink designed to be sipped, and her friends hand her one of theirs clearly encouraging her to do the same again. They’ve already promised her more and reference it’s going to be a ‘fun’ night (aka she’s going to get wasted, and drink to forget).

I get it. It happens. It’s real. It’s kind of funny. Probably no one will suddenly start binge drinking on the back of it... but if you work in an industry like alcohol you have certain responsibilities. Fun as alcohol can be it also ruins millions of lives and kills a similar number of people. It is a dangerous substance that you must treat with care when communicating.

For that very reason most of the big alcohol companies, as well as industry bodies like the Portman Group and International Alliance for Responsible Drinking, go to great efforts to show the industry can self-regulate by having rules exactly against adverts like this. People do down drinks, they do drink when they are depressed, they do drink to forget bad things, but all of these things are potentially dangerous misuses and not something that should be glamorised.

There are organisations like Alcoholics Anonymous, the World Health Organisation or regulators like the Advertising Standards Authority who will rightly look at this and wonder if the industry really can look after itself. A reckless copy released onto unconstrained digital channels, with deliberate mass market appeal, which will most certainly also be seen by (and appeal to) many under legal drinking age too.

Yes I’m being over sensitive, yes I don’t think it’s THAT bad... but having had to present to many of those organisations during my time working in the industry, and having had to understand the true impacts alcohol can have, it pains me if we’re going to be so star struck by this ad for years to come that we don’t at least call out that advertises have some responsibility to do the right thing. The original advert they are responding to wasn't THAT bad in some people's eyes either.

I have randomly spent a lot of the past 24 hours arguing this point even though I have no real skin in the game - many many people disagree with me (especially those who don’t work in advertising at all) but plenty (especially those who have worked in the industry) see that there is something a little darker than harmless fun here - countless have told me their company or their country wouldn’t allow it.

And we should call that out as well as the brilliance. ESPECIALLY as the whole point the ad exists is that it’s a response to an original ad which was open to negative interpretation about a situation and motivations. It’s not that clever to make the same mistake twice.