The age of inclusive advertisements

I was just browsing through the website of Paramount Airways, another new airline that is decorating the crowded and promising Indian skyline. I was struck by the simplicity of the website, and more importantly, the simplicity of the ads.

Here’s one clip. I guess this pix/ad is copyrighted et all, but what the heck, I’m speaking good things about them!

Anyway, what’s different in this ad is the presence of normal-looking, simple people. Considering that the airline has only business class suites (but still is supposedly priced at economy levels, which they say is their USP), the easiest thing for them would’ve been to catch a bunch of sleek looking models, make them wear a black suit/skirt, spectacles et all, give them a laptop, and make them give a pensive look – with probably a slanted pen in the hand. But that would hardly paint the real picture.

Most of the time, the airline crowd is made of simple looking people who are immersed in their own life and are least bothered in giving a business-type impression. Letting aside the few odd fully-dressed foreigners who have some business in India, and probably some holidaying crowd, most of the crowd is brown-skinned Indian. Considering this, what really is the point of having white-skinned sleek looking models (men and women) as we see in most of the airline ads? Isn’t all this phony? I agree that we would like to see ‘perfect’ people in the ads, but isn’t their presence everywhere boring and artificial?

In contrast, this ad portrays the real picture - by including simple but yet educated and sophisticated looking people; the kind of people who really adorn the airliners. This is close to the heels of the over-hyped Dove ad the latest Nike ad that stresses on the fact that being not-so-perfect is perfectly fine. Afterall, not everyone is bestowed with wafer thin waists and clear skinned personas.