Bandstand’s Lottie Marriner picks her (International Women’s Day) Desert Island Ads
Hmm. Five ads that empower women. What do we mean exactly, empower? Not to buy deodorant or shoes or expensive serums or jeans that promise to make us both thinner and “thiccer,” surely. And not the #empowerment kind that you can wheel out on days like IWD – so a brand can cheer and clap and be oh so proud of just how progressive it is, before reverting the very next day to being a brand that doesn’t care about equal pay or flexible working or having female directors.
I know, I know. I can hear you rolling your eyes from here. CHILL OUT, LOTTIE. Because of course there are ads which truly empower women; that start a conversation or change the narrative. There are even some brilliant ones I’ve consciously not added to this list (we salute you, Bodyform!) because you’ll find them on every IWD list everywhere. But these are five ads that have all resonated with me and, let’s be honest, made me wish I’d done them.
Desert Island Ads
Every Stain Should Be Part of the Game – Persil x Arsenal Women
This ticks so many boxes for me. The art direction is simple and elegant and gut punching. The insight (6 out of 10 girls avoid playing sport on their period in case they leak) is brilliant. The photography is real moments of real female athletes actually bleeding. And the collaboration with Arsenal Women means it will get the massive spotlight it seeks and deserves. Brands like Bodyform (hey, again!) and Always mean that periods have got a small corner of the social playground to chatter in, but it’s so good to see a mainstream brand like Persil tackle that taboo and shame in a really inspiring way.
PowerPoint – Maltesers (part of the Celebrating Similarities series)
This was the first ad I saw which not just referenced menopause, but actually made women going through it the stars. Funny, deft and original, this is part of a series (which Maltesers extended to include disability and LGBTQ+ themes, amongst other things) which told a story that no one in the mainstream had heard before, making the invisible, visible. I’m not saying it’s the most perfect example of film craft, but what it stands for – challenging conventions with wit and levity – is so powerful.
This Girl Can – Sport England
I know this is an obvious one but it’s just so brilliant I can’t not include it. Pacy, joyful and slick, beyond the execution it’s also made huge leaps in empowering women of every shape, size and ability to get active (2.9 million of us, apparently). This ten-year-long campaign has genuinely reshaped the sporting landscape and each evolution still feels important and timely and fun.
So Win – Nike
This is such a “Nikey” ad that I actually thought I’d seen it before. It’s a space they’ve played in a fair bit, most notably with the spectacular Serena Williams, so it’s not a shocking pivot or departure or anything. But. The fact that this was the first Super Bowl ad they’ve done in nearly 30 years? The fact that they chose the Super Bowl – a hyper-masculine stage where the world watches men charge around a field hoo’ing and ha’ing while they smash into one another – to put out such a strong, feminine f*** you? Now that is empowering. The use of Doechii – swamp princess super babe – is the cherry on the cake.
Body Proud Mums – Mothercare
This print campaign came out when my youngest was five months old and I was deep in the ‘going back to work soon but still feel like a puffy, wild-eyed, sleep-deprived wreck’ stage. There’s been loads of mum-powerment ad campaigns in the last five years or so, but this one really stood out for me. The photography is beautiful and the line is simple and insightful. Yes, Mothercare wants you to spend lots of your hard-earned cash with them, but those images undeniably do so much good to normalise really thorny, tricky feelings that so many women feel in those early throes of motherhood.
Lottie Marriner is creative director at bandstand.
