Stupidity Follow Up

Buffalo Trace Newsletter ran the following story this morning:

NYC Vodka Billboard Pulled After Uproar

Community Leaders Call ‘Escort Quality, Hooker Pricing’ Ad Insensitive

Source: KXLY

February 23, 2012

A controversial Wódka Vodka billboard hung up in New York’s Bronx borough was taken down after drawing the ire of community leaders intent on cleaning up the area’s image.

The “Escort Quality, Hooker Pricing” ads were posted around the city, but community leaders in Hunts Point said the billboards didn’t help their efforts to shed the area’s reputation as a prostitution hub, the New York Daily News reported.

According to the publication, the ad was removed Wednesday and the company apologized for the insensitivity of its placement.

“We talked to the community board,” Brian Gordon, managing partner for the marketing company, MMG, told the newspaper. “We wanted to help them out … People understand what we’re trying to communicate. There are certain people who, for very specific reasons, have an issue with it.”

In 2011 Wódka Vodka generated an outcry by the Anti-Defamation League after it hung up holiday billboards around the city that offered “Christmas Quality, Hanukkah Pricing.”