Virgin Trains tries to sex up travel on East Coast line

Virgin Trains is attempting to get back on track following the Jeremy Corbyn “traingate” row with a new innuendo-fuelled marketing campaign, which urges people to ditch car and plane travel and take the East Coast train instead.
The initiative, devised by TMW Unlimited, encourages the public to swap the inconveniences of domestic air travel (check-in, luggage allowance, lack of connectivity, and landing far from city centres), and road use (traffic jams, road works) for Virgin Trains.
Two 60-second ads, which will be shown on Facebook and across AOL’s ad serving platforms, feature couples engaged in ambiguous discussions which could be interpreted as an open exchange about their sex lives. In fact, the couples are comparing their negative experiences travelling by road and air with an altogether more relaxing journey on Virgin Trains.
The campaign runs alongside Virgin Trains’ ‘Plane Relief’ offer, where flyers between London and Scotland are able to take advantage of first and standard class discounts on the East Coast route. Standard class tickets begin at £15 each way and First Class tickets at £30 each way.
Twenty thousand discount codes are up for grabs to entice the public to take advantage of the near half-hourly service connecting the centre of London with the heart of Edinburgh, and other destinations in Scotland on Virgin Trains’ east coast route.
Virgin Trains East Coast managing director David Horne said: “At Virgin Trains we like to do things a little differently, so we’ve decided to highlight the fantastic experiences we offer customers compared to road and air travel in an entertaining, playful way.
“With free on-board Wi-Fi, free movies, TV episodes, magazines and games on Beam, our new on-board entertainment service, delicious food from our revamped menus, refurbished trains, increased rail connectivity between the English and Scottish capitals, and frequent services to the heart of cities along the East Coast, we’re hoping that our tongue in cheek approach will encourage even more people to hop onboard.”