Aviation Gin spoof of Peloton’s Bike advertisement

Aviation Gin’s ad in December, 2019, has been labelled as Marketing genius by those in the industry. Ryan Reynolds and marketing content partner Michael Dewey, planned via a text message to make a ‘spoof’ of Peloton’s bike advertisement as a campaign for their gin brand which unintentionally went viral. The Peloton bike ad encapsulates husband gifting his wife a bike, where she then creates vlogs over the year documenting her exercise journey giving thanks to the bike for ‘changing’ her. Being labelled as ‘sexist’, ‘dystopian’ and ‘elitist’ by journalists and writers around the globe, it was the contextual relevance and timing of delivery by Ryan Reynolds that made the spoof blow up all over the internet within days.

When the idea for the campaign arose, it began as a text from Ryan Reynolds to his marketing content partner, Michael Dewey, where it was 75 hours later that the advertisement would become viral on the internet. Reynolds reached out to the actress in the Peloton video, Monica Ruiz, attaining confirmation as to if she would be interested in acting in the ‘spoof’ of the Peloton ad that she was featured in. Ruiz accepted the role although it mocks the advertisement of her client’s ad entirely. Once editing and filming was complete, the Aviation Gin campaign was released on twitter by Ryan Reynolds with the humours caption ‘Exercise bike not included’ resulting in 9.4 million views by December 9, 2019. The advertisement resulted in 7000 retweets and over 41,000 likes on twitter soon after its released, with Michael Dewey expressing how this created unprecedented increases in sales of the gin brand. The Aviation Gin ad features Ruiz at the bar starring into the camera sitting with friends with gin classes in hand, where she is relaxing – although looking upset – to contrast against the ‘judgemental’ overtone of Peloton’s advertisement. One of the friends in the advertisement says ‘it’s safe here’ with Ruiz replying ‘to new beginnings’ sculling her gin beverage soon after.

The sexist undertones of the advertisement caused a 9% drop in Peloton’s shares, the equivalent to a loss of $US942 million, before the spoof advertisement was released. In an interview between BBC and Peleton, the company expressed the idea behind the advertisement as meaning to celebrate a “fitness and wellness journey” and in a statement mentioned that they were “disappointed” that viewers had misinterpreted the concept behind the campaign. Peloton is a high-end and expensive exercise equipment company established in 2012, who sells various fitness products through membership program as well as outright. The Peloton bike is an indoor bike with a TV attached for buyers to use workout programs directed by fitness professionals. The company has developed a large fan base, with some marketing professionals mentioning that the ‘sexist’ advertisement has not entirely affected their client base.

Overall, the marketing genius lies in Dewey and Reynolds ability to use visual puns to send subtle humorous messages to viewers, successfully expressing the ‘sexist’ features of their advertisement. The sculling of the gin by Ruiz at the end of the spoof campaign is relevant to the Gin company, as well as being a retaliation against views of marriage and body image that are instilled upon women. Additionally, this unintentional publicity of Reynold and Dewey’s campaign opened up the conversation of sexism and gender roles in society in a humorous manner, successfully turning something negative into a positive.