Virgin Atlantic - No Ordinary Park Bench

Virgin Atlantic - No Ordinary Park Bench

As we reported earlier this year, Virgin Atlantic has recently been driving it’s promotional efforts in the US, in a way to communicate its point of difference between itself and it’s competitors. The British airline likes to show that it does things differently, and their latest award winning campaign has done just that.

Virgin’s latest efforts involved a park bench in New York City that the airline had specifically built to mimic one of their aircraft seats. Passers by, who took refuge on the seat were treated to a little Upper Class service from Virgin Atlantic.

The participants were offered champagne by Virgin Atlantic crew and even a menu to choose their cooked lunch and selection of desserts. But the main event was as the members of the public were treated to some ‘in flight entertainment’ with a difference. Selecting their chosen film or game from a touch-screen placed in front of them, brought their favourite characters to life as they charged through the park. Dozens of extras were used to recreate space invaders or a period costume drama, including characters on horseback.

The events were documented on film and were quickly broadcast on YouTube and twitter, the video receiving 250,000 hits in one month alone. Promoting the airline’s unusual experiment, airline CEO Sir Richard Branson took to Twitter to ask: “Is this the world’s best bench?”

The elaborate publicity stunt was watched by over 10,000 spectators. NYC based website traffic increased 12%, NYC to London bookings were up 8% and 10% booked Virgin Atlantic for the first time.