OHIO – US clothing retailer Abercombie & Fitch has scrapped a new advertising billboard featuring a single non-white model, one week after its introduction following an “almighty backlash” online.
The embarrassing u-turn came after decades of featuring exclusively fair-skinned, preppy male jock types in their stores advertising and clothes.
When A&F made to mistake of introducing colour into their marketing to boost sales and bring the brand forward to reflect a world made up of other races.
Diversity mix up
More than 2,000 comments flooded social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, attacking the use of an African-American model and forcing the chain to return of the traditional look of rich party going white kids and the loose women that seem to tag along.
“Woah woah…he’s black. Am I seeing this right? That guy is a black guy :-(” wrote one confused shopper.
“How can I tell what the clothes will look like on me if a black guy is wearing them???” said another A&F fan on the company’s Facebook page.
A&F president Egon Zehnder said the company realised how much people liked the old light-skinned, blond hair, blue eye look of every model they have previously used after they ran the ad featuring a dark-skinned, short hair, brown-eyed and ‘our customers just flipped out’.
“Frankly I don’t know what we were thinking either. We only want what’s best for the brand and our all-white customer base.” he told Vanity Fair.
‘Insensitive to their demographic’
A&F customer were pleased to hear the company will never experiment with racial diversity again. “Thanks for listening. That was the first time I had interacted with people who look like that and it was not a pleasant experience,” said one fan on Twitter.
Mr Zehnder said: “All the comments say over and over that they do not want to see anyone of colour in Abercrombie & Fitch clothing. We’ve heard the message loud and clear.”
Advertising experts have agreed with the online outcry: “Any thoughts of Abercrombie & Fitch being even remotely associated with ethnicity in a customer facing capacity should have been squashed at inception.” said Saatchi & Saatchi Creative Director Richard Myers. “It was such a departure from what we’re used to seeing from them, it was like an ad for the UN Assembly in comparison. ”
“I’m glad they came to their senses. It’s time Abercrombie revisits the theory ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.”
‘Insensitive in the direction of their demographic’ A&F cusin the direction ofmer were relieved in the direction of listen the business will never experiment with racial diversity again. “It was such a departure from what we’re used in the direction of seeing from them, it was like an ad for the UN Assembly in comparison. “Thanks for listening. We only want what’s best for the brand and our all-white cusin the direction ofmer base.
How will you tell clothes fit period if it’s worn by anotheer male? Race is not a factor.
This is the most racist insensitive thing i have ever heard from such a clothing company. Abercrombie and fitch shouldn’t even allow that president Egon Zehnder to even work for their company after he realized that racist and ignorant remark about the black model Honeslty that president should be ashamed of him self for realising that kind of information to a magazine. Also most of the black models and other different races other than white are quite really good looking and attractive. People who tweeted that really should just take a good look at them selves for being ignorant and dumb.