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Loading...UPDATE: Lessons in Bad Advertising: Don’t Use Babies to Emulate Underwear Commercials
EDITOR’S NOTE: When this post appeared, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide asked us if they could offer a response since they were not directly involved with the creation of the ad. Here it is: “Ogilvy, and our client Kimberly-Clark, unequivocally disavows this ad mock up produced by our Korean agency partner. The ad in question is not a real ad, and we feel it is distasteful and inappropriate, and want to publicly convey that in no way was it requested or endorsed by our client Kimberly-Clark, nor the GoodNites brand. Unfortunately, an agency employee took it upon himself to post the layout on the Internet without the knowledge of the client nor his agency superiors. We have instituted disciplinary proceedings and are reviewing our ad processes around the world. We take advertising and marketing of our clients‚ brands extremely seriously and find this behavior unacceptable.Eleanor Mascheroni, Chief Marketing Officer, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide eleanor.mascheroni@ogilvy.com
THE POST:There is often a very fine line in advertising between brilliant and offensive. Unfortunately, Huggies diapers not only crossed it, but appears to have turned around and potty-trained all over it. Say it with me, Huggies – “Replicating underwear ads with toddlers is NOT ok!”
At issue is a recently released ad for Huggies GoodNite training pants for a Korean marketing campaign. The picture is supposed to be an homage to an undewear ad pose by soccer start David Beckham. Sweaty, dirty, shimmering, the Beckham ad oozes sexuality. And, he’s pulling on a rope.
Get it? Because I’m sure they were worried they were being too subtle.
Now try it again, but this time, with a two year old.
The only thing ickier than that ad is the creative team who came up with the idea.
I’ve written often about marketing trends to over sexualize young children, from the toddler girl “boyfriend jeans” to last week’s “9 year old lingerie line.” But perhaps the most frightening aspect of this trend is that the advertisers themselves just don’t seem to see a problem.
When The Bad Mom’s Club wrote about the Korean ad campaign, then were contacted by the ad agency itself, who asked them to remove the critical post, stating they didn’t see anything wrong with their ad:
[W]e did not expect people to feel this negatively about this ad.
If you can pull “rope” ad we would really appreciated it. If not we understand.
Truly, our intention was a parody to a designer underwear ads. We would never want to exploit children in any way what so ever.
We are very sorry for all this inconvenience.
It should be simple marketing rule: don’t use sexy to sell things for kids. But sadly, it seems that many advertising campaigns can’t come up with any other ideas.
Read more: huggies, hypersexualizing children, sexy ads and kids, womens rights
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may
not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.
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+ add your ownWhat happended to the child worker protection act ?
Poor kid... the parents should be embarassing theirself.
What were they thinking...
Let kids be kids for goodness sakes !!!
This has nothing to do with culture!!! American mothers are no different or have you not noticed the 4 little princess pagent reality series that have sprouted up on A & E. A pediphiles dream no longer do they have to linger at school yards when they can live out their fantasies in their living room. I watched 5 minutes of this crap and was so disgusted to watch a poor excuse of a mother forcing a 5 year old to a series of classes in one day while she cried the entire time until she escaped and went outside to play on her swing set...finally left alone to be a child. This "cow" that calls herself a mother needs to have her children removed from that hell hole.
Stop pampering kids with designer underwear or whatsoever. The money could go to somewhere else.
No kidding!
NOBODY NEED TO ADVERTISE UNDERWARE.....THIS IS A SICK SEX SCHEME....FOR SICK MINDS...AND NOTHING MORE......!!!!!!
If cultural differences (ie not seeing the ad as in any way sexual from a Korean standpoint) and diversity are to blame for this ad, than it is time for companies to hire someone to see that an advertisement much of the world finds offensive never reaches the "outside" world. We can't complain about what we never see. Should we complain about this ad when it was a mistake that allowed it to be viewed on the internet?
Now, are we willing to put the shoe on the other foot and censor all the North American ads that reach a world wide audience and are offensive to say Muslims, (or any other group you choose)? I sincerely doubt it.
Yeah, i would say that Sylvia B says it best up above...Marketing to pedophiles....Sick!!! as if kids arent exposed to enough of that filth.
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