Episode 170 - Bodyform Ad Reviewed by Ruggable and the Conscious Advertising Network
With the “Never Just a Period” short film, Bodyform tick off a lot of creative boxes and use fantastic imagery and poignant examples to really depict how women experience periods throughout their lives. But this ad, chosen for us by Contagious, doesn’t seem to have much follow-up, despite bringing forward a very relevant discussion point.
In the latest episode of Advertisers Watching Ads, guests Charlotte Ford (Europe Senior Marketing Director at Ruggable) and Laura Lesser (Director of Communications at the Conscious Advertising Network) have their say on the execution and concept behind the ad, as well as what they wish they’d done better (or more of).
Episode 170 - Bodyform Ad Reviewed by Ruggable and the Conscious Advertising Network
Transcript
This is automatically generated, so it’s not 100% accurate.
Tom Ollerton 0:00
Hello and welcome to Advertisers Watching Ads. This is a show where brands watch other brands’ ads.
My name is Tom Ollerton. I'm the founder of Automated Creative, and we are brought to you, as ever, by our lovely partners, Contagious, and before we get to this week's ad, let's meet this week's guests.
Charlotte Ford 0:46
I'm Charlotte Ford. I'm the Marketing Director for Ruggable for Europe.
Laura Lesser 0:46
And hi, I'm Laura Lesser, formerly of Diageo and Virgin Media O2. And I'm volunteer Comms Director for the Conscious Advertising Network. I'm currently actually looking for work, so get in touch. If you're looking for someone who is incredible at social media and brand marketing.
Tom Ollerton 1:07
And myself from Automated Creative have known Laura for a long time, and we can back up those facts, so please reach out, but after the show. Right... Let's see this week's ad.
On a scale of one to five, hold up your fingers for how amazing you think this is. One, two, three... Brilliant. So, Charlotte, what are we looking at here? This is a big master asset, video, film, they call it, but what was going on in the background?
Charlotte Ford 3:58
I think it’s a perfect encapsulation of what women go through from their first ever periods and all of the different nuances of the way or the different ways in which society lets them down, I think through the lack of education, lack of understanding around what women go through. It's a really brilliantly shot piece. I think it perfectly blends humour with, I think, a seriousness of some of the situations in there. I also love the tagline, “Live fearlessly,” or “Live fearless,” that is a fantastic way to sum up the approach of Bodyform. But yeah, it seems to mean this is a standalone hero film asset. I haven't seen it translate much through into kind of all the areas of Bodyform’s advertising, but yeah, I think I'd take my hat off to it.
Laura Lesser 4:43
Yeah, I love the energy behind it. I love the... how many different life stages that they showed because they really went from your, your first period to say like when you go to smear test or even getting your period while you're breastfeeding. And I can't really think of any other brands in this category or even in women's health that would really tackle that such a diverse range of experiences, and I could really identify myself or my friends throughout the film.
Charlotte Ford 5:12
So even just showing blood is revolutionary in period advertising, which, you know, it's not... There's not that many brands that do show that. They still show the weird blue liquid. Every time I see that, I'm like, “How on earth is that meant to be bodily fluids?” Like, unless you’re a robot. So I think even just starting with that, obviously, started out really bold in comparison to other brands of the category.
Tom Ollerton 5:36
It's a great watch, and it's bold, and it's strong, and there's so many, like, ticks all the way through it. You're like, “Yeah, yeah, that's really cool.” Mixed media... Casting’s really good. There's all these nods to kind of history, right? Visually and so on and so forth. I almost feel in some ways it's too much of a big idea.
Laura Lesser 5:51
With the end line, “What do you wish you'd been told?” You kind of expect them to really be encouraging discussion, but when you look on their, say, their TikTok or their Instagram, it's just really the hero film, and maybe a week later, three or four cutdowns and not many sort of comments behind it, but what I would have loved to see was working with influencers and maybe some reactive comment based off of the, the comments that they were getting through. They could have produced content and sort of what's the, what's the call to arms after that? Because I looked on their website and they're doing loads of good stuff, kind of investing in research and period education, but it kind of ends a bit downbeat and in a way and like, defeatist, I don’t know... But kind of, yeah, what's, what's next? And what can people do and what's the brand doing?
Charlotte Ford 6:46
I wonder if there's, them missing a trick in the sense of there should be a social campaign element here in the sense of they should be working with the government around what is revolutionizing period education look like for the next generation and Bodyform of every single brand in that category has the license to lean on the government to say, you know, what does period education look like for... not just for women, but also for boys as well, you know, boys don't... I still remember at school, boys were very much separated from us when we were learning about periods. That's really weird. They shouldn't be. So actually, you know, what, what could they do more, I suppose, to campaign on a societal level to really change things and make... and make that change happen.
Laura Lesser 7:30
With the storytelling aspect of it, there could have been a bit more inclusion, sort of somebody's male partner supporting them or even showing something in somewhere like the workplace, just to encourage a bit more allyship. And yeah, men can be involved too and it shouldn't be such a taboo. I remember so many times sort of being in the office and being on my period and hiding my tampon as I went to the toilet or things like that unless there's still so much embarrassment in the workplace and we're all adults, so we know it happens every month for most women. So why can't men be part of this campaign as well, rather than just showing women in the support roles here and the man being really dismissive?
Tom Ollerton 8:16
It's a category that is being sort of put under scrutiny by TikTok, right? So if you just have a flick through the category like the vulva, is it really absorbent? More absorbent there than anywhere else in your body? And yet there's, there's allegedly chemicals and products in there that just aren't good for anyone's body. And so I'm curious to know, do you think they should be addressing that as well? Like there are, there are downsides to this product that are being talked about. Bodyform here are breaking the taboo. Brilliant. But actually, are they kind of inheriting a problem that's going to come back and bite them later on?
Charlotte Ford 8:51
I'd say they're probably seeing their own market share be eroded and then thinking that bolder brand-led storytelling like this is going to help them regain a share. And the bravery will hopefully help them stand out in a kind of TikTok, that generation who are much more cynical about brands and will happily choose the sort of younger challenger brand over the kind of bigger, more established competitors. Whereas like, you know, back when I was 11, my mum would have got, you know, got me, Bodyform or Tampax because that was really the only two brands that you had. So I think there's a lot more choice now for consumers, which they’re probably very aware of.
Tom Ollerton 9:29
So unfortunately, we've run out of time. Would you sign off this campaign in its current form? Okay. Charlotte, Laura, thank you so much. We'll see you all next time.
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