Cathay Pacific turns typo on airplane livery into clever marketing strategy

When life throws curveballs at you, sometimes it's better just to roll with it.

At least that's the mantra that Cathay Pacific seems to live by.

When a typo on the livery of one of their planes surfaced online on Wednesday (Sept 19) morning, the Hong Kong airline didn't hide it, but instead posted it on social media.

They wrote on the same day: "Oops this special livery won't last long! She's going back to the shop!"

[embed]https://www.facebook.com/cathaypacificHK/photos/a.328739223936454/1464840316993000[/embed]

And instead of brickbats, they actually won praise from many netizens who were impressed by their quick and light-hearted response.

[embed]https://twitter.com/MichaelKorjen/status/1042335133213315072[/embed]

[embed]https://twitter.com/matgallagher/status/1042277395938521088[/embed]

One Twitter user however, was not appeased:

[embed]https://twitter.com/yanhoelee/status/1042305973308710912[/embed]

Another user thinks it is a smart marketing gimmick that other airlines could follow:

[embed]https://twitter.com/knaviation/status/1042331407232557057[/embed]

According to the South China Morning Post, it is not clear who is responsible for the mistake, but the expensive error is likely to cost "several thousand dollars to fix".

Unfortunately, the same tactic could not be deployed when errors in the Singapore Tourism Board logo was seen in the backdrop for the Crazy Rich Asians' Los Angeles premiere.

The letter G in "Singapore" on the banner looked like it was spelt with a C - thus reading "Sincapore", while the tagline "Passion made possible" was missing an I. Warner Brothers said in its response that the lettering on the red carpet wall had melted due to extreme heat, leading to the errors.

candicec@sph.com.sg