Virgin Trains refuse to advertise The Stand

Virgin's onboard magazine rejects advertising from Scotland's largest comedy club, due to worries over gun crime.

Feature by Ariadne Cass-Maran | 20 Nov 2008

Virgin Trains have refused to advertise The Stand Comedy Club because of concerns that their logo [pictured] promotes gun crime.

Tommy Sheppard, the owner of The Stand, has directly appealed to Richard Branson for good sense, following Virgin's decision not to advertise the club in their onboard magazine, a decision which Sheppard has called "as ridiculous as it was insulting."

The letter states,

"We are an established comedy club and have used the same logo for over ten years now. The logo – a child in a cowboy outfit pointing a toy gun at his own head whilst speaking into a microphone– works as a metaphor for stand-up comedy.

"Clearly we are extremely dismayed and concerned at the suggestion that our club in some way condones or encourages gun crime. Nothing could be further from the truth."

Sheppard calls the move "political correctness gone mad" and asks for Branson's "personal intervention to reject such silliness and to allow our advert to go forward as per the original agreement with the publishers of the Virgin Trains Magazine."

http://www.thestand.co.uk