There’s something a tiny bit contemptuous about Asda’s response to the recent story that its £70 flat-pack bike is only slightly less dangerous than an un-earthed electric chair standing in a puddle downwind from Niagara Falls on a moderately blustery day.
Mark Brown, director of the Association of Cycle Traders, noticed that in the TV advert, Asda had managed to put the front forks on back-to-front, meaning that if you managed to avoid steering the thing into the path of a double-decker bus, you’d almost certainly come a cropper with malfunctioning brakes. It was also pointed out that a self-assembly bike is actually maybe not that much of a good idea in principle, since you’d really need a range of tools and technical know-how in order to put it together safely. Aside from which, the bike’s components are utter shit.
As the Guardian’s reviewer noticed:
The derailleur, gear shifts and more are made by a brand that sounds like Shimano but isn’t. It’s even written in the same font.
Asda’s response was to pull the TV ad. But, rather foolishly, its press office attempted to mask the fact that the supermarket is – in the view of at least one expert – selling dangerous merchandise with a series of crap bike-related puns.
A spokeswoman said: “As soon as we spotted the error, we put the brakes on the TV ad and pulled it. Our agency is back-pedalling as we speak and we will be wheeling out the new one tomorrow…”
So, if you’re unlucky enough to have bought one of these things and find yourself in an unfortunate death-related scenario, remember to think about the Asda press office’s funny bike jokes. It’ll hurt less.
The Conversation {1 comments}
Simple bad PR, or actually bad contemptuous PR?
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