Drawing a line in the hurricane

Posted at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Disasters

Though tacky, is this Hurricane Sandy-themed ad offensive?

The AdFreak blog says, "clothing brands appear to have committed the biggest brand fails of Hurricane Sandy, with both American Apparel and Gap forgetting that death and loss make a poor springboard for promotional messaging."

The sensitivity meter, it's safe to say, was pretty much turned off in sombody's office. But in other locales, it's turned up pretty high.

At the time, this seemed like a pretty innocuous tweet...

BREAKING: Frankenstorm upgraded to Count Stormula #sandy

— Hailey Zureich(@zhailey) October 30, 2012

Jim Romenesko's journalism blog, however, carries a message from the head of the Michigan nurses' union that doesn't so much criticize the original tweet as the fact the Detroit News retweeted it.

From DAWN KETTINGER, communications director, Michigan Nurses Association: We've been watching from afar in Michigan, seeing all the horror our fellow human beings are facing, and also stories like nurses heroically saving lives by evacuating hospitals last night in NYC, literally keeping vent-dependent babies alive by manually bagging them as they walked them down flights of stairs. Then we see media doing things like this [the Detroit News retweeting the "Count Stormula" crack].

But does a retweet indicate a disrespect -- or even a lack of sensitivity -- for first responders?

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Comments (3)

Are they looking for negative publicity because they believe that any publicity is good publicity? Do they think that their ad as written will get them more publicity than if the wrote this:

In case you need some extra help after the storm...20% off for the next 36 hours.

Would we be talking about that sale?

Posted by Jeff | October 30, 2012 2:53 PM

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Looks like it was a 3.6 hour, not a 36 hour sale. The ad isn't on their website.

Posted by Jeff | October 30, 2012 3:05 PM

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I reserve the right to not be offended by everything the media implies I should be offended by.

Posted by Disco | October 30, 2012 3:15 PM

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