Richard Branson defends Virgin’s overtly sexual advertising

MELBOURNE - Brit industrialist Sir Richard Branson has defended his fondness for posing with and using scantily clad women in promoting his Virgin Group, saying they help him stay in the limelight.

Branson, 58, who was responding to an accusation made last week by The Advertiser’s Amber Petty, who attacked Virgin’s overtly sexual advertising, said that using attractive women to sell products was an age-old practice.

“The problem, I believe, with her argument is that if the next time I promote a product I line up with three male models the photo won’t get into your paper and the new business won’t get talked about,” News.com.au quoted him as having written to The Advertiser in response to the article.

“The old-fashioned way of promoting products and businesses has worked for centuries and picture editors are unlikely to let it die out soon,” he said.

Petty had also stated in her column that Branson “can’t land in a country without paying girls in bikinis to fall all over him at the other end,” and that Virgin was resorting to “the old 1970s template for selling products”.

Celebrity agent Max Markson agreed with Branson’s method of selling his product.

“The first thing is sex sells, always has, always will,” Markson told The Advertiser.

“You try to knock Richard Branson when that’s what the media wants, and that’s what the public wants; even women love looking at attractive women,” he said, citing actress Angelina Jolie as an example. (ANI)