Earlier this year, social media users, the press, and pretty much everyone with a viable Internet connection, had a field day when the news of Fyre Festival’s ultimate failure began to circulate.
The inaugural festival was conceived as a luxurious island getaway, complete with bikini-clad celebrity guests, white sand beaches, and an “immersive” live music experience. Think Coachella, but in the Bahamas—not a bad idea, in theory…
In execution, however, things quickly fell apart. Guests arrived and realized that the elaborate advertising campaign rewrote a couple key factors:
Many models were recruited to promote the festival on their social media platforms and in a promotional video (of which the obviously immense budget alone probably should have tipped us off). One of these models, termed “Fyre Starters,” was Bella Hadid, who ended up being the only one of the recruits to release a statement about her involvement after the Fyre Festival metaphorically burned to the ground.
Today, the Dior ambassador admits that the blunder made her wary of making endorsements via social media. “It’s a different kind of job that I don’t do very often,” she told InStyle. “Now I tag everything as an ad.”
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Probably a good call, Bella—maybe next year the Fyre Festival will also learn and grow from its mistakes.