The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2025
Nanfu Battery compared a trip with your boss to its long-life cells — China cringed
The high-speed rail ad read: 'I love travelling with my boss — just like Nanfu, lasting endurance.' The brand apologised and pulled it the same day.
Nanfu Battery · 2025-09-18
What happened
In September 2025, Nanfu Battery (南孚电池), one of China's best-known battery brands, placed an advertisement on high-speed rail trains. The ad read: 'I really love going on business trips with my boss; it's comparable to Nanfu Battery, with lasting endurance and ultra-long battery life. We start talking work when we get on the train and can keep talking after we get off, not tiring at all!'
The ad was immediately criticised online as sycophantic (谄媚), suggestive (擦边) and offensive (冒犯). Critics said the copy normalised an unhealthy workplace dynamic — an employee performing enthusiasm for mandatory time with a superior — and used the battery metaphor to make the subservience sound like a product feature.
Nanfu responded on 18 September, saying: 'Due to insufficient consideration, the ad triggered controversy; we deeply apologize for the misunderstanding caused.' All disputed content was removed the same day. The apology did not prevent the case from being cited in Chinese media roundups of 2025's worst marketing failures.
Why it happened
- The creative treated a workplace power dynamic as humour without recognising that the audience — commuters on the same trains — would read it as an endorsement of the dynamic, not a joke about it
- The battery metaphor ('lasting endurance, ultra-long battery life') mapped product attributes onto human subservience, making the ad read as celebrating the employee's inability to stop working
- The approval chain did not include a reader who would flag the tone as sycophantic rather than lighthearted — the ad was approved by people who found it funny
- High-speed rail advertising reaches a captive audience of business travellers, the exact people most likely to find the premise uncomfortable rather than amusing
The lesson
A joke about workplace power dynamics lands differently on the people inside those dynamics — test ad copy with the audience who will feel it, not only with the team that wrote it.
Aftermath
Nanfu removed all disputed content on 18 September 2025 and issued a public apology. The case was included in China Youth Daily and Tencent News roundups of 2025 brand marketing failures, alongside other '翻车' (crashed) campaigns. The brand's battery market position was not materially affected, but the ad became a reference point for discussions about tone-deaf workplace humour in Chinese advertising.
Sources
- China Youth Daily: Nanfu Battery high-speed rail ad controversy
- Tencent News: 2025 brand marketing failures roundup
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