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Private Jet Companies launch ads against media backlash
Jet Makers Cessna Aircraft Co. and Hawker Beechcraft Inc. are launching new marketing campaigns that aim to convince company execs that private aviation is still the best way to travel.
The Cessna ad states, “Timidity didn’t get you this far.” Then it ends with, “true visionaries will continue to fly.”
Cessna Chief Executive Jack J. Pelton stressed that support needs to be given to companies that have the “good judgment and courage” to use corporate jets. Or else, the whole industry might not survive the recession.
“The reality of business aviation is a far cry from the misconception of CEOs flying in large luxurious airplanes,” Pelton said in a press statement. “Most of these aircraft are fairly Spartan, designed for business, with a cabin about the size of a minivan or SUV interior.”
The Textron-owned Cessna has announced plans to lay off some 4,600 personnel by the end of March. That’s about 30 percent of the company’s global workforce.
The ad campaign aims to counter the current “misinformation” about companies that support private jet aviation. The tarnished image coupled with the economic recession has hampered private jet companies. With the new campaign, which will be released on national business newspapers, magazines, and aviation publications, Cessna hopes to correct the growing “misinformation.”
On another note, airplane maker Hawker Beechcraft Corp. launched an advertising campaign for the King Air 350, calling it the “the world’s greenest and highly efficient aircraft.”
The new ad even throws statistics to consumers. As described by Tali Arbel of the Chicago Tribune, “The ad states that one of the Detroit CEOs would have saved about 220 gallons of fuel and thousands in operating costs if he had flown the King Air 350 to Washington instead of a Gulfstream jet, made by a unit of General Dynamics Corp.”
Just like Cessna, Hawker Beechcraft also has lay offs. Earlier this month, the company cut 2,300 jobs which proceeded 500 lay offs late last year.
”The media and some politicians have cast general aviation as a wasteful extravagance instead of a critical business tool and the source of millions of American jobs,” wrote CEO Jim Schuster in a letter that announced the layoffs.
Rightfully so, internal statistics indicate that aviation employs 1.2 million Americans. Cessna said the industry adds more than $ 149 million to the US economy annually.
