‘You will take these red lips
seriously.’ So runs the tagline on one of the posters for the current ad
campaign by the Boots-owned cosmetics brand, No. 7. Predictably, the woman on
the poster, below whom the tagline sits, has very red lips. Less predictable,
perhaps, is the colour of her hair: grey.
A video
on the No. 7 website tells the ‘story’ behind the campaign. In it, the
grey-haired woman, Ali, who is 48 and contemplating 50, flicks through a series
of adjective-bearing placards before choosing one and holding it up for the
camera: self-conscious. She talks
about feeling the same way she did when she was 18, the impossibility of her
‘aging body’ reflecting this feeling, and a desire to ‘make more of myself’.
After a sped-up makeover
sequence, during which the bright red lipstick is applied, a relaxed, laughing
Ali tells us she feels ‘empowered’ and that she wants to be seen out having a
drink. She holds up another placard. This one reads: in charge. At the end of the video the poster and its tagline
appear on screen, commanding the viewer to take Ali’s lips seriously.
Is it possible to take lips
seriously? The answer must surely be no (lines of metaphysical inquiry unknown
to me notwithstanding). Ideas can be taken seriously, as can arguments,
relationships and works of art, but not lips. Lips can be admired, kissed, and
used to play the harmonica. The phrase ‘these red lips’, then, in the context
of the tagline, must act as a code for something else, something that can be taken seriously.
In order to try to understand
what that something might be, it is useful to think about one of the strategies
that has been used in advertising for nearly 100 years. In his brilliant documentary series, The Century of the Self, the filmmaker
Adam Curtis tells the story of Edward Bernays, a nephew of Sigmund Freud and
the father of the modern PR industry. In the series, Curtis describes one of
Bernays’ first PR stunts (in 1929), which was for a campaign for the American
Tobacco Company aimed at getting women to smoke. In coordinating his stunt,
Bernays recognised two things: that there was a deep desire amongst women at
the time to be freer of patriarchal control; and that a culture had been
fostered by men in which it was deemed socially unacceptable for women to
smoke.
The stunt ran as follows: first,
Bernays hired a group of young debutantes to light up cigarettes at an Easter parade
in New York; second, he told the press to be ready with their cameras, as a
group of suffragettes were planning to stage a protest at the parade; and
third, when the ‘suffragettes’ lit up and the newspapermen started taking
photographs, Bernays gave cigarettes a tagline: ‘Torches of Freedom’.
After the stunt and the
subsequent press coverage, sales of cigarettes to women soared. Bernays had
made women feel that by buying cigarettes and smoking, they were challenging
male power and were freer, as a result. Societal norms that prevented women
from getting well-paid jobs and taking control of their own lives, of course,
remained unchallenged.
Bernays’ strategy – of
identifying a deep emotional need or desire within women and making them feel
as if that desire can be fulfilled through the consumption of a product – is
exactly the same as the one underlying the No. 7 ad. Back in May, the Guardian
published a report on a study conducted by the Commission
on Older Women showing that there is a huge shortage of women over the age
of 50 visible in public life. According to the report, women make up just 18%
of TV presenters over the age of 50 who appear on screen regularly for the main
UK broadcasters. Also, women over 50 make up only 5% of all presenters
appearing regularly on screen.
With no one to represent them on
a public platform as widely disseminated and consumed as TV, the opinions and experiences
of older women are being ignored. It might be said, then, that there is a
desire amongst women in their late forties, early fifties and older to be more
visible in public life and for their views and concerns to be taken seriously.
Enter lipstick.
Because there is another way in
which older women feel ignored, one that is articulated by the No. 7 model,
Ali: in terms of their physical appearance. It is this desire, for one’s body
to be noticed and appreciated, that No. 7 claims explicitly to be able to
fulfil. For Ali, it works – she wants to give herself the opportunity to be
seen in public, and her confidence in achieving some degree of visibility makes
her feel empowered and in charge.
Just as US women in the 1920’s
were made to feel as though they were winning some freedom by buying
cigarettes, women nearing or over 50 – the No. 7 ad’s target market – are made
to feel as though they are winning some degree of presence and visibility in
public life by buying make up. But, like the American women, the objective
circumstances of older women are not changed – their views and concerns are still
excluded and ignored.
The implication of the No.7
campaign that its make up will not only make older women look better, but also
younger, serves to heighten the expectation of a more visible presence in
public life: according to the data collected by the Commission for Older Women,
39% of all TV presenters are women, demonstrating that younger women face less
of a challenge in appearing regularly on screen.
When decoded, the apparently
meaningless tagline ‘You will take these red lips seriously’ starts to make
more sense: ‘You will take me
seriously’, or ‘You will take my views
and concerns seriously’. Above the tagline, the woman with red lips and
grey hair continues to smile.
