Adweek reported Unilever is using its Dove brand to address beauty ideals for women in India. Um, Unilever is behind the Fair and Lovely skin-lightening product, which makes the Dove effort a fairly lovely act of hypocrisy.
Dove’s Latest Mission? Revamping Beauty Ideals in India
Brand hopes to spark change with new short film
By Kristina Monllos
Dove’s got a new short film, Let’s Break the Rules of Beauty, which champions a more inclusive approach to beauty for Indian women.
The 50-second short, from Indian film director, screenwriter and documentary filmmaker, Pan Nalin, showcases a variety of women whose look and style doesn’t necessarily fit the Indian beauty ideal of “youthful looks, fair skin, long black flowing hair and a trim figure.”
“[This] is the first Dove Masterbrand campaign created specifically for India,” said Victoria Sjardin, senior global brand director, Dove Masterbrand. “India is a country growing and evolving at a rapid pace and yet the traditional beauty ideal remains narrow and restrictive. In fact, our new research suggests 76 percent of Indian women believe that in today’s society, it is critical to meet certain beauty standards.”
According to the brand’s research, the pressure to comply with Indian beauty ideals comes from external, traditional and societal factors and 80 percent of India’s 631 million women believe that they need to look a certain way to do well in life.
“This campaign is designed to encourage India to embrace its diversity in beauty, and spark change against the variety of pressures and influences that are keeping a narrow beauty ideal alive,” said Sjardin. “Our hope is to genuinely start a conversation about expanding the beauty ideal and embracing the varieties of beauty that come from a country with 631 million women, 29 states and 22 languages.”
The digital campaign isn’t the brand’s first effort in India. Hoping to raise the self-esteem of young women in India the brand launched the Dove Self-Esteem Project in 2014. It has already educated 300,000 young people to date and, according to Sjardin, the brand aspires to reach 2.65 million young people by 2020.
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“Driven by these programs, we've seen significant improvements over time for all minorities, with close to 55% of our management positions currently held by women and approximately 20% by people of color, which we believe are industry-leading results.”
http://www.thestreet.com/story/13542316/4/interpublic-group-ipg-earnings-report-q1-2016-conference-call-transcript.html
IPG is up to their usual tricks of fudging numbers again.
Know what I would love? For a NYT or WSJ reporter to ask, directly, “What are the exact numbers of minorities, who are American citizens (and not brought here to work on a visa, and not including people of color in overseas offices) that are in management positions in your United States offices?”
In other News from Deutsch
Deutsch has made five senior hires this year, all of whom have been white men. That is something of a trend, no?
Favat: I don’t know if it’s a trend. We’ve hired new people but we’ve also promoted females into senior positions. We’ve promoted people like Kim Getty in LA to president [Jan 2015] and Pam Scheideler is now chief digital officer of LA [Feb 2016]. I’ll also say that In LA, from a CD standpoint, we have promoted six women up to senior level roles as creative directors.
I think what happens is, the photo dictates so much these days. We even wrestle with that — do we include a photo or not? It’s that one photograph in that one moment that makes it look that way. But when we promote someone to a CD, there’s no photo, there’s no story. So in some ways maybe we should start writing stories that these people are getting promoted.
So beyond the picture, there was no discussion about the need to find something other than two white men to fill these roles?
Favat: No, because, I don’t think any of us look at somebody as a white person or a black person or a woman or an African American. We look at people as, Do they have the talent and the skill set to take on this role? And also a person who clients just adore. We look at that and say, "Who would fit that role?"
Sawyer: I think your question is very apropos for an organization where you look across the board at senior leadership and it’s predominantly white men. That is a seriously missed opportunity. We’re very fortunate that because we do have such a well-balanced organization from top to bottom, we can just focus on bringing in the right talent. Yet we do believe in the whole notion of diversity of thought, and I think it’s paid off very well.
http://www.campaignlive.com/article/why-deutsch-hired-two-white-male-ccos/1393060#YyE4BklstK1c5zR5.99
Deutsch can talk, talk and talk some more but all I hear is, "We hire and promote white people because they really are the best and most skilled for all jobs, everywhere, naturally, by default. Everyone else is lesser and not as good, obviously."
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