La Gomme à Mâcher, Air France Chewing Gum
Air France
Issue 45 | December 2017
Agency
BETC Paris
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officer Remi Babinet Executive Creative Directors Ivan Beczkowski, Jasmine Loignon Creative Directors Marie-Eve Schoettl, David Soussan Creatives Chloe Perignon, Chrystel Jung Art Director Nathan Brunstein
Production Team
Director Flaminguettes Production Company RITA
Date
July 2017
Background
As all travellers know, take-off and landing can sometimes cause pain in the ears. The cabin pressure varies and can block passengers' ears.
Chewing can be enough to balance this internal ear pressure and make the flight more comfortable.
For Air France, caring about every detail of their customers' flights was paramount. Even managing 'popping' ears.
Idea
Air France created its very own French chewing gum, available in two distinctively and typically French flavours, pistachio-macaroon and crème brûlée.
The gum was made in France and was 100% natural.
It was offered on flights from Paris to the USA and Mexico and was on offer in Air France lounges at Paris Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports.
To raise awareness of this 'savoir faire' approach to passenger relations, packs of the gum were mailed to journalists and influencers.
In addition, the experience was translated to Snapchat as well, with a Gomme à Mâcher lens.
Results
40,000 packs of the gum were sold within a week and 30,000 mailed and given away.
There were over 25 million media impressions and 6 million views of the launch video.
Our Thoughts
If you want to know how successful this mailing was, just Google 'Air France Gomme à Macher'. It comes up with over 16,000 results. Sure, not all those links will be to the campaign but the first few pages are all news stories from around the world about the macaroon and pistachio flavoured gum.
The video has got 1.5 million views on YouTube and a stack more on Facebook.
The Drum even posted a video of their newsroom staff all sampling the products (to mostly favourable reviews.)
All of that attention simply has to rub off on the brand, making Air France appear a lot more inviting than British Airways, say.
That's the thing about an idea these days. If it's interesting and new, it gains currency in social media almost immediately. Putting it into the hands and mouths of influencers and journalists is how you fuel the flames. Mail, don'tcha just love it?