Peloton's sexist Christmas ad has likely boosted the brand despite the backlash

American fitness company Peloton’s shares have crashed out of the race on the back of its spectacularly cringeworthy Christmas ad.

In it, a guy buys his model-slim partner one of its £2,000 exercise bikes. She uses it every day, getting up at the crack of dawn to do so, and produces a video diary about how much she’s “changed” (despite not appearing to have changed at all), screening it for him at the end of the year. It’s seven shades of awful, a syrupy piece of sexism straight out of the 1950s — and has been lampooned just about everywhere.

Peloton’s USP is that users can take live exercise classes hosted by shouty instructors on a screen attached to the bike (that is, if they pony up a monthly fee — £39 on these shores).

The company has been described as the “Netflix of fitness”.

And not only can you watch said shouty instructors — they can watch you. Remember the bit in 1984 where Winston is doing physical jerks in front of the Telescreen and gets upbraided by his instructor because he can’t touch his toes? Peloton has realised Orwell’s nightmare.

Despite — or perhaps because of — this, the bikes all the rage, attracting celebrity super fans like David Beckham and Hugh Jackman. The horrible truth is the ad may have boosted the Peloton brand even further.

You might be wondering why no one at Peloton raised any issues with the ad prior to its release. It’s because companies like Peloton make a big fuss about employing a certain sort of person — the kind of person prepared to disengage their brain when they enter the office, where they are required to respond to everything with a loud “hey woo yeah”:

“Anyone like a coffee?”

“Hey wooo yeaahhh!”

“I need a volunteer to sort out some paper work.”

“Hey, woo, yeaahhh!”

“...it’s pretty dull stuff.”

“Hey, woo, yeaahhh!”

“How about a Christmas ad where we get a woman to report back to her boyfriend on how much the Peloton he bought her has changed her?”

“Hey, woo, yeaahhh!”

I briefly worked for a company like this, and because I didn’t respond ecstatically to everything was immediately labelled as a negative influence.

Listen, Peloton: you need people like us. In fact, it ought to be the law that businesses must have at least one professional cynic on staff. A certified grinch to sit in a corner and dunk on the CEO’s daft ideas.

The reason they won’t is because all press is good press (sometimes). Peloton has been on CNN, Fox, NBC — you can’t buy PR like that. While it is currently taking the mother of all kickings on the stock market, some of the people who watched the news coverage of the ad might check out the company. Maybe they’ll meander onto the Peloton website; read the positive reviews of the bike; consider gifting one to their significant other (please, please don’t).

It’s possible that the ad will make the company think twice next time: no one likes seeing their stock price knocked into next week. Shouty investors in suits are almost as bad as shouty instructors in lycra. But if more people are intrigued than put off by it, they won’t. And the cycle (sorry) will continue.

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