SCP Interactive: Edge Theory: An All Black Plane?

Friday, 30 July 1999, 3:05 pm
Article: Alastair Thompson

Photo http://img.scoop.co.nz/stories/images/9907/747.jpg - source www.nzedge.com Kevin Roberts - The 747 I'd like the All Blacks to fly to the World Cup in…"

New Zealand's most celebrated patriot Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide boss Kevin Roberts is back with another big idea.

When last in New Zealand he delivered three speeches on his New Zealand edge theory - (See..www.nzedge.com Kevin Roberts new site launched recently).

Now Roberts wants Air New Zealand to paint a plane "all black with a silver fern" to take the All Blacks to the Rugby World Cup. Coincidentally the plane is also the one that Kevin Roberts himself appears to want to fly to the World Cup in.

Roberts told Scoop today by fax he is sure it would be a great way to get on the front pages of all the British Papers - not to mention impressive TV coverage. "How else could NZ get this kind of coverage," he said.

He may well be right but his advisors admit they know not a lot about the practicalities of painting a plane black - maybe it would get hot?

What do you think? Scoop wants to know. Please email editor@scoop.co.nz with your views.

Scoop will also be asking the Rugby Football Union - of whose board Roberts is a member - and Air New Zealand - who recently became ex-Saatchi & Saatchi clients - what they think too…. watch this space.

Coincidentally today the Tourism Board is due to announce its global tourism marketing campaign strategy in Queenstown.

Earlier this year Saatchi & Saatchi were sacked from the account by the Tourism Board after Kevin Roberts had dinner with the PM… See links below.

Earlier Scoop Coverage On Kevin Roberts

7-May-1999

1:15 am: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson NR Feature:Playing Politics With Saatchi & Saatchi - Just what does it mean to become an "ideas" company? Aside from having dinner with the Prime Minister, losing a $50 million contract and getting a considerable quantity of egg on your face that is.

11-Mar-1999

1:57 am: Editorial Alastair Thompson NR Comment: God Defend Our Right To Mediocrity - Roll film. "New Zealand - come to a place where we will take you down a peg or to."

24-Feb-1999

12:50 pm: Editorial Alastair Thompson NR Column: What Is This All About? - Okay. Let's say, for arguments sake, that Prime Minister Jenny Shipley did talk about tourism to Kevin Roberts at dinner on August 31.

23-Feb-1999

3:57 pm: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson Questions Of The Day (1-6) - Mike Moore's progress towards position of Director-General of WTO - PM's words with Kevin Roberts - Importance of tourism - More Roberts - What risk of Govt re-entering commercial banking - More Roberts - Prison phone call monitoring.

3:24 pm: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson Questions Of The Day (7-12) - Parole - Saatchi And The PM - Economy -Pukekohe Flood

2:20 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn NR House: Statement Blocked, Uproar In House - The Prime Minister's attempt to make a personal statement in the House her dealings with Kevin Roberts and various comments on them was blocked amongst scenes of uproar in the House this afternoon.

11:15 am: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson NR Column: The Meaning Of Kevin Roberts - Last week the word "Saatchi" became, in Parliament at least, a pejorative term. This week the mudslinging is continuing at pace. With millions of dollars of contracts potentially on the line, Dinnergate, is fast becoming an advertising companies worst ...

8:36 am: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson Letter Poses Problems For PM - A letter released last night as part of a package of documentation on the scrap between Tourism Minister Murray McCully and the Tourism Board has the Prime Minister Jenny Shipley back on the ropes.

12:19 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: Confidence And Statements - The Government will at some point this afternoon get around to the first confidence vote of the year, that the vote itself has been obscured by a cloud much of the Government's own making will not be lost on many MPs.

22-Feb-1999

11:02 am: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson NR News Puzzle Answers - Who Cooked The Dinner? - Unfortunately NewsRoom cannot yet report that it has any real idea what the true answers are to its puzzle questions on the PM's dinner. We do however have several suggestions and guesses...

17-Feb-1999

5:18 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: Mud, Tickets And Colenso - The House's afternoon session has been dominated by mud-slinging scenes which could point to one of the dirtiest election campaigns in history.

3:33 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House Today: Questions, Saatchi And TV1 - Question time saw tempers flare as Ministers and Opposition MPs attacked each other over Jim Anderton's claims of deal making between the Prime Minister and the head of Saatchi and Saatchi, Kevin Roberts.

2:36 pm: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson Questions of the Day 1 - Tabling Wars Continue -

7:18 am: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: Like We've Never Been Awa - Parliament quickly returned to regular patterns of behaviour yesterday after the long summer break.

16-Feb-1999

7:09 pm: Staff Reporter Alastair Thompson The Dinner That Wasn't - The Tabled Documents - A transcript of the tabled letter which makes the allegations concerning Saatchi's followed by transcripts of the diary entries of the Prime Minister and John Luxton used as part of their comprehensive denial of said allegations.

5:53 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: PM Rules Out Saatchi Claim - The Prime Minister has made a statement to the House categorically denying assertions by Jim Anderton that she did a deal with Saatchi and Saatchi that saw the advertising company get a Tourism Board contract in exchange for running National's election ...

4:19 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: Luxton Rejects Deal With Saatchi's - John Luxton has categorically rejected claims that he and the Prime Minister stitched up a deal with Saatchi's for the advertising agency to do the National Party's election campaign cheaply in exchange for gaining the Tourism Board's global advertising campaign. ...

4:17 pm: Staff Reporter Ian Llewellyn The House: Saatchi Deal Claim - The Alliance Leader has accused the Prime Minister of stitching up a deal with the advertising company Saatchi and Saatchi to get the Tourism Board's global campaign and in exchange the company would do the National Party's election campaign for a ...

© Scoop Media

Alastair Thompson

Scoop Publisher

Alastair Thompson is the co-founder of Scoop. He is of Scottish and Irish extraction and from Wellington, New Zealand. Alastair has 24 years experience in the media, at the Dominion, National Business Review, North & South magazine, Straight Furrow newspaper and online since 1997. He is the winner of several journalism awards for business and investigative work.

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