Air Korea: Now With Less Koreans???

2007_Global_Print_Advertising_Bird, originally uploaded by IT Blog.

Among the very first lessons my mother tried to teach me: first impressions matter (see snappy title gone wrong). That must be why I was so taken aback when I started browsing a recent issue of Forbes and saw the above ad for Korean Air. The distinct lack of Asian representation in most of their advertising leads to an absurdly simple question. Does Korean Air want to be a multi-local? I understand that stretches the definition a bit, and takes a few things for granted, but bear in mind: currently Korean Air operates in more countries than McDonald’s did in the mid-nineties [37 vs. 25 via brandchannel]. A mildly useless fact except when taken in context with the growing trend of airline misnomers (If my recent Northwest airlines flight from Detroit to D.C. is any indication). Indeed, a well developed marketing strategy could lead some of us to accept Korean Air as our own, taking into account our misguided concept of airlines as regional.