There’s arguably no airline as talked about in Southeast Asia right now than Vietnam’s low-cost carrier Vietjet Air, which caught the world’s attention largely thanks to its occasional bikini PR stunts.
But would such controversial stunts fly in Indonesia, or are bikini-clad flight attendants too offensive for the country’s conservative sensibilities?
Yesterday, Indonesia’s Tourism Ministry posted a press release on their official Instagram page announcing the possibility that Vietjet would add a couple of routes to Indonesia, specifically Jakarta and Bali by mid-2017.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BSgW4Y7Dh6L/?taken-by=kemenpar
However, an official at the Transportation Ministry said that Vietjet has not yet filed an application with them to open any routes to Indonesia. As for their flight attendants’ famous uniforms, well, those eager to catch a glimpse probably shouldn’t get their hopes up.
“If we look at the way stewardesses dress [in Indonesia], they’re polite and inoffensive. So if the airline gets a permit [to fly to Indonesia], they have to follow the rules that apply here,” said Agus Soebagio, head of the Public Relations Division at the Transport Ministry’s Aviation Directorate General, as quoted by Kompas yesterday.
Also, despite their extensive use in the airline’s highly effective marketing campaigns, since Vietjet Air launched in 2011 the company has only occasionally had their stewardesses don their trademark red bikinis for special events such as inaugural flights to beach destinations and on their company calendars. The PR stunts have undoubtedly proved fruitful for the low-cost carrier, which is projected to take over the majority of Vietnam’s airline market share in the near future, and has already made its CEO, Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao, the first female billionaire in the country.
