One of Infiniti’s values is Japanese hospitality. Infiniti sent a car to pick me up. The driver got out of his car to greet me and the first thing he said was ‘Hello, Mr West.’ There was an Infiniti-compiled CD playing when I stepped into the car.
The greeter at BA’s business lounge held out her hand for my boarding pass before she’d made eye-contact with me. Inside, the salad bar smells of the toilet blocks which are situated next to it.
That’s where I spotted BA’s ‘Children must be accompanied’ sign stuck on the wall; the words turning the friendly, curving logo below into a false smile.
Which one of BA’s recently advertised ‘Fly to Serve’ brand values does that tone of voice represent?
Children are a nuisance, sometimes. But then, sometimes, so are mobile-phone ranting, silent-but-deadly farting adults who spread their bags over 4 seats. And they don’t have to be accompanied by anyone.
To me, the inadvertent verbal identity of BA’s sign reveals how the brand is struggling to understand an informal, less hierarchical world.
The words are a reaction by a brand that can no longer expect everyone to wear a suit and tie, but can at least try and make sure that children are seen and not heard. They’re a bully’s words.
On the way into T5, big banners proclaim how proud BA is to welcome people from all over the world to London in 2012.
Let’s hope they don’t bring their kids.
I also think that sentences which are sanctified with a capital letter should be honoured with a full stop. Copywriters should be accompanied at all times.
This is funny. We’re having a Very Hard Time (Adrian’s temples are throbbing) with Mums and Dads who ignore their own children in the café. Screaming, drawing on walls, scraping furniture from one end of the basement to the other, ripping up books, it’s pretty hard to deal with and we are losing customers. The customers who are actually paying for things.
We have to construct a sign to ask parents to encourage their children to be more aware of the impact of their behaviour but should we actually be more egalitarian and ask EVERYONE to get on board with the community vibe and necessity for mutual respect for fellow coffee-drinkers and their own personal space/time/peace??
Help.
hi Jane – I love Society Cafe, Bath. And I love your question.
It’s a challenge for somewhere which is a Third Space – not office, not home – to balance authority with hospitality.
Get it wrong and you lose customers. Do nothing, and you lose customers.
At Verbal Identity, we like to say that questions about a brand’s tone of voice are usually questions about its commercial and operational issues. But when we say that, our clients like to throw things at our heads.
Perhaps you could recognise the conflict of different users with a small sign something like this,
“Share the love, share the space.
(We’re happy to be a break from the office and a break from the nursery, as long as everyone else is.)”
You could get one of your regular artsy-office types to design one version of the sign. And get a persistent child-offender to draw another version (though not on the walls).
Good luck. Let me know how it goes.
C
x
Thanks Chris. Love the idea of a dual sign – maybe even on the walls! Will let you know how we go.
“BA’s sign reveals how the brand is struggling to understand an informal, less hierarchical world.”
I work in insurance and have some (but not much) sympathy with BA – I can vouch for the fact that this issue isn’t uniquely theirs. Problem is you can’t be all things to all men (and all women, and all children).
Realising that ‘that’s how we’ve always done it’ is the best reason not to do it any more is the first step. The second is having the courage and conviction to make it happen.
But that’s easier said than done, of course…
hi Nick
thanks for the message. Couldn’t agree more about doing it differently. There’s something called the Semmelweis Reflex observed by Behavioural Economists…basically, people don’t change because they think everyone else would’ve changed if it was necessary. The most dramatic example of this unfortunately was when the first doctor identified that the simple job of washing hands before surgery could lead to fewer deaths from infection. All the other doctors said, “If it were that simple, we’d all be doing it.” And did nothing…Change is good.
