Now that The Apprentice is back, I have taken to practicing my Lord Sugarisms over my morning coffee. I'm working on the art form of his boardroom zingers, where he rattles off a poorly conceived and even-more-poorly executed dad-joke that manages to get a room full of people laughing. I am yet to succeed.
Anyway, this week we're only looking at two campaigns, but they are big ones. With International Women's Day approaching on March 8th, we're looking at two campaigns focused on changing perceptions and realities of women in two major areas of life.
Here's the work from Pregnant Then Screwed and Persil.
1. Pregnant Then Screwed: Shredding Mothers' Futures
The brand, which focuses on raising awareness of and fighting maternity discrimination, has launched a campaign called 'The Career Shredder'.
The focal point is a live-stream of a giant shredder destroying the CVs of anyone who takes part in the campaign (by visiting this website). It will be streamed to a billboard in Westfield, as well as on the site itself.
Surrounding that main activation is some OOH work with the line, "Mum you're fired."
Sitting behind the work is research that shows that in the last decade, the treatment of soon-to-be or recent mothers has worsened. Up to 74,000 women every year now lose their job for getting pregnant or taking maternity leave – an increase of 37% from 54,000 in 2016.
It's a really stark and brutal campaign, in keeping with the subject matter. There's something so... hopeless about the idea of CVs being shredded and destroyed. Think of the times you've looked at your own CV, when you're applying for a new job and that bit of doubt creeps in about whether you will or won't get the role. Think of the symbolic value that CV holds - your life's work to date, and the key to the next chapter.
I think there's lots to learn from the work here, but the key takeaway for me is not shying away from the most powerful ways you can tell the story you need to tell. This campaign could have been a TV ad, featuring a mother being discriminated, feeling twisted inside at the unfairness of it. We would have sympathised, even felt outraged... but it strangely would have been quiet and private, happening in our homes. The media choice, broadcasting this metaphor for wasted potential in real-time, in a very public space, feels very smart.
2. Persil: Fighting for Every Stain
In a partnership with Arsenal to battle the stigma around period blood.
I'm a United fan, and the fear I feel any time we kick off is a natural part of football at this point.
What is entirely unnatural is the fact that more than half of teenage girls have stopped playing sport because they are afraid about stains and leaks they might have while on their period.
And yet, that sad statistic is true, according to a Unilever study.
So Persil, enemy of all stains equally, launched this campaign, featuring Arsenal players Beth Mead, Leah Williamson, Kate McCabe and Kim Little, to point out the biggest hypocrisy underlying this stat: other blood is ok in sport, so why not this blood?
That's the story told in the OOH executions, which feature a range of female athletes with blood-stained gear.
The TV ad tells a story of a slightly different hypocrisy - that other stains (like mud and grass stains) are perfectly accepted parts of football, so why not blood? Small variation, same overall message.
It's another really well-made campaign, for a similar reason as the PTS one. Agency MullenLowe got to a great nugget by framing the hypocrisy of it all as the enemy - not the fear or shame itself, nor the faceless people who might be perpetuating them. It allows the campaign to speak about the resilience and toughness of athletes without having to explicitly say it.
I think that's what makes this campaign so good. It has a perspective and an attitude towards sports, not towards the social issue in isolation. It's not just a bland message of encouragement or a preachy soap-box ad; it's a call to action to young girls, who might be worried about period blood, that they and their bodies are part of this game.
Besides the content of the campaign itself, the roll out was handled really well. The stars of the TV ad and partnership with Arsenal led to the campaign being launched right around the Emirates stadium ahead of the North London derby (the team's biggest game of the regular season), with more to come on IWD, March 8th. So keep an eye out for that.