AirAsia brand sentiments soar after CEO jokingly 'punishes' passenger on flight

Capital A's CEO, Tony Fernandes, is no ordinary leader and regularly makes personal appearances on the group's airline, AirAsia's, fleet of planes to engage with customers personally. Recently, Fernandes boarded a flight to help flight attendants hand out free drinks to customers. 

During his rounds, the CEO noticed that one of the passengers had brought outside food onto the plane, something that is in violation of the airline's regulations. 

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In a TikTok video posted by Fernandes, he can be heard jokingly saying, "Report, report. She brought illegal food."

He goes on to say that no outside food is allowed and then 'punishes' the passenger by saying that she will not get any free drinks. Fernandes also took the opportunity to promote the airline's inflight meals and wrote in the caption of this post, "Just pre-book your Santan meals. It's way cheaper than outside food and drink."

Fernandes' joke took the Internet by storm with sentiments regarding him shooting up to 78.6% positive and 0% negative, up from 66.1% positive and 16.9% negative, according to media intelligence firm CARMA.

Many on social media praised Tony Fernandes for being humble and confronting the passenger for breaking the rules. While others have been curious about how the woman managed to sneak her meal onto the flight.

Many of the words associated with AirAsia also were to do with Fernandes and the situation with "passenger”, "video", “punishes” and “food” coming out on top. 

The sentiments stand to reason that netizens have since forgiven the CEO for a LinkedIn post he made in October last year that landed him in hot water. 

In October, AirAsia saw its brand sentiments plummet from 13.9% negative to 33.2% negative after its chief, Fernandes, took to LinkedIn to share a topless photo of himself in the office getting a massage while conducting an online meeting, according to media intelligence firm CARMA Asia. 

“Got to love Indonesia and AirAsia culture that I can have a massage and do a management meeting,” he wrote in the post.

In a statement to MARKETING-INTERACTIVE at the time, a spokesperson from the communications team at AirAsia said the unconventional sharing may have raised eyebrows for some, but the recent image was taken during a unique moment when Fernandes was multitasking, juggling a management meeting and a brief shoulder massage session.

“Everyone on the call, including our female management was asked if they are comfortable if he had a shoulder massage, after 18 hours of work. We have a fun, friendly and open culture at Capital A that values productivity, efficiency as well as transparency,” she said.

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