To feel a bit put out that 70% of spending is controlled by women but ...

[alicatte]

To feel a bit put out that if 70% of spending is controlled by women why is 80% of our choice of product made by men? I was really shocked at how few women are at board level
www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/320000/bis-women-on-boards-2014.pdf

I can't help feeling that experienced women should get to make the CHOICE, rather than just being in a focus group.

hidden so all those products were created by men with no input from women at all?

Why would a woman be able to make a better ironing board? Do men not use them?

Contraception messes with hormones and so will always have some sort of impact on some women.

Speculums they have changed over the years.

Plenty of jeans out there for wen with curves. I am a body builder and have a sizeable behind and quads, I manage to find jeans. Check out pink cola. They accommodate curves.

The point is a product it's not guaranteed to be better because it has a women's input. There should be more women on boards of companies, but that doesn't mean that products will be better. Just different.

Until both men and women become more comfortable with sahd , to the point sahd are just as common as sahm there will be less women in the Board room.

Teenage DS is the main user of the iron in this household & he hasn't complained, so presumably that's because those problems don't affect males (I guess).

Yeah I don't understand short-rise jeans either. JLo sells super expensive high rise designer jeans so you pay £200 to just get a bit of extra waist band which is what suits most of us. Maybe those products really are designed only for teenage boys.

Those pink cola jeans look great, does anywhere sell them on the High Street? Or at least do they have a fantastic and easy returns policy? I hate buying clothes online.

You can buy high waisted jeans in Next, and ones that are curvy.
And Next is about as mainstream as they come!

yeolde they are great. The woman who sells pink cola in the UK is very helpful. If you take your measurements she will ensure they fit. Returns are easy wtc. although I have never had to return a pair. I know a couple who have. Great quality and fit.

Maybe your teenage ds doesn't complian about the ironing board because you have a decent one? I or dh have never had problems with ours. It's about 15 years old.

Marketing is already very female right up to Director level and very embracing of working round employees different needs , working from home half the week is bog standard, dress down is 24/7 at most of the London ones. Lots of part time or freelance consulting opportunities. The brand teams are usually 60-70% female IME even if the top CEO level is quite male.

Making a product pink has been shown to double sales to the poster who bemoans pink btw. To the demographic that buy it , it has connotations of childhood/childish things , childhood feelings of being happy, safe/secure.

Making a product pink has been shown to double sales to the poster who bemoans pink btw. To the demographic that buy it , it has connotations of childhood/childish things , childhood feelings of being happy, safe/secure.

That doesn't shock me. I dislike pink, though not because the whole 'pink stinks' stuff, its just not a colour i like. So i wouldn't make products for women pink. I don't think i would sell many.

Thats my point. I am woman but would find it difficult to sell certain items for women. Being female doesn't automatically mean I would create better, mpore appealing products for women.

Thank you everyone. I can see that many people think that design is gender neutral which I agree with.

If you have time I would really like to know what you all think about company direction?
Might the choice of areas to develop such as durability of products? Manufacturing strategies. Or even just the choice of product portfolio (using products which are already at an advanced design point) to promote be affected if there were more women on boards?

For example, I have a lot a perfume and make up, which I really don't manage to use up because they just contain too much product. This is a common experience amongst my friendship group and to be honest, was also the case when we were all young. I would love to buy smaller amounts. That could be an example of a variation in a product strategy.

I didn't know about Siri, crumbs. But I do know a bit about focus groups and testing. You have to be so careful what you ask, because that is the only information you will get. It's nice to hear that there are more women involved in marketing now.

I think company direction again will be down to the individual, not their sex. Both men and women are capable of running businesses effectively or running them into the ground.

The make up example.....really depends on the reason they make that particular size. I am in manufacturing, when deciding size we decide on price point and value for money. Smaller sizes are less value for money and sometimes it means it will sell less iyswim.

Again I would like the teams of people who decide these things to come from both sexes and all backgrounds and cultures.

The individual, imo, is more imporatant than whether they are a man or a woman.

The make up sizes is nothing to do with a board full of men who have never used foundation!

Spartan is spot on with price point.

But also - companies don't WANT you buying a little bit of this, a little bit of that - from a competitor.

You buy a bigger size, because that's what is available. Think about these scenarios:

• you decide it's not your colour. Bugger - another foundation in your make up graveyard. But the company made their money whether you used it or not.

• you're not totally sold on that scent, but you carry on with it so as not to waste it. You get used to it. You come to like it. It becomes "your scent". Your husband sees it on your table and when it gets low thinks "I'll get that for her birthday". It becomes a habit. You buy more.

Women are just as capable as men at exploiting that behaviour in consumers!

Er, the ironing board came with DH. I bought a new cover for it a few yrs ago. DS helped choose the new iron itself after last one blew up (we agreed on bright purple and pink: this for the lad who wants a military career). He especially wanted a good steam function.

All this marketing stuff just confuses me.
I don't care for "brands" or company direction or "brand image".
I don't wear perfume or makeup. Do the stores not sell taster sizes?
I don't watch adverts, am trying to train myself to notice promotions in supermarket, though.

Thanks for replying you three. I guess in some ways you are more feminist than I am in thinking that 'fairness' is important on its own and that boards should be gender and ethnicity balanced anyway, even if that confers no advantage. I suspect I am older than you and so come from a generation that would need to justify that.
I am still not entirely sure I am being unreasonable - but I take your points.

If no woman ever went part time or flexi time or gave up work when babies came then we would have more women than 20% in positions of power. In a sense we cause our own misfortune. Our personal decsisions to stay home are political and have huge ramifications for other women and society so even if it feels easier to be at home don't do it - think of other women.

I couldn't do it Daisy. I was in a HoD position and an acting director. I had to repay my maternity leave it was terribly hard, we downsized and our families helped out too so we could do it. In some ways I was lucky to so easily redirect myself in later years, I did love my first career but I love my second one too. But I can honestly say that some women friends who went back to the same companies/industries - juggling away have been disadvantaged. I suppose I do think this is unfair, but I still think that their life experience should have been valued, they were able to bring all those subtle bits of understanding to decision making. Not everything is a VFM 'can of beans', nor is perceived as such by the market I think. I guess that here I am talking about one friend who did work in a bit of a 'salary man' company where her family was seen as a distraction from the work family perhaps I think.

Gosh you can see how old I am - 'salary man' !!!

Imagine if women only spent their money with companies that support women - have equal numbers of women and men at a senior level, offer great maternity leave, flexible working etc.

We could change the world for each other if we got organised

As I said, boards should before mixed. I just don't agree they would make better products or decisions.

Imo the whole sahp is the issue. Many people (men and women) assume the woman will be the sahp. Lots of women dont want their oh to be the sahp. Lots of men think it should be the mother that takes that role.

It's that thinking that needs to change, until then there won't be equal mixes of gender on boards.

I wouldn't make my purchasing decisions based on how companies treat women. If they were breaking the law, then yes I would avoid using that company. Or going out of their way to damage women in the work place. The same as I won't use Starbucks or amazon.

I want companies to treat their employees as equals. The fact remains that if a man took a career break of several years (or even only a year and then returned part time) their career would suffer too.

As the numbers of sahd increase, I will be interested to watch what happens to the 'pay gap' etc

I don't think we should be talking about ironing boards (mine is amazing, by the way), but broader industries like finance.

Trading, for instance, has been mentioned as a field particularly well suited to women. First of all, we're BETTER at it - see here and I WISH I could find the article I read a couple of weeks ago, poss. in the Sunday Times about how fund management is a very scalable job so very suitable to flexitime or part time work. It's not tied to different time zones or markets and you just manage the number of funds appropriate to your hours, so you can work 3 or 4 days a week very easy, and still make masses of money.

But when has trading or fund management EVER been represented as a woman friendly industry? They are the very financial areas we probably think of as being the most male-dominated!

It's not about board quotas, it's about encouraging our 6 year old girls to be competitive, to run faster, to think of maths as innately suited to their interests and through secondary school to quietly present finance, investments, money and so on as representing specifically female interests - after all, if they're going to be the ones to spend 70% of it in the end, they should be managing its growth it in the first place!

If 50% of all trainee fund managers are young women with degrees in economics then it follows that 50% of board members will eventually be women, especially if it is a career that doesn't have to stall when you have children and choose to come back with a flexible workload. Hopefully by that stage, our daughters' husbands will also see the virtues of an 80% week and

It's not fair (and I say this as a feminist with extremely strong beliefs) to chastise companies in these industries for not having full female representation at board level, when our daughters aren't applying for their entry level jobs in the first place.

(I'm thinking specifically of the financial industry in this post, obv.)

It starts with women's expectations and aspirations though.

I believe that one reason that more women are the SAHP is driven by them bring lower earners in the first place. Until that point, both genders had already the same chance at a career, "unhindered" by being a parent. Yet is she already earning less, with less prospects?

Why?

Maybe some of it is still external - glass ceiling, poor attitude of employer.

But is it also because she didn't actively chase her career? There is research too that when men and women read a job advert, women apply if they meet all the must have criteria. Men take a punt even if they don't. (not all men, not all women - but this has been researched. My own company sent a warning brief to managers that they should watch for this and encourage female subordinates to apply outside their exact achievements)

There also seems to be a common differential in ages. I have no idea of the stats on this, so apologies for anecdote. I'm inadvertently one - I've never dated anyone less than 4 years older than me. 4 years between say, 24 and 28 are key early career building years. So again, the older partner is probably earning more, probably has more prospects and probably is male.

I think the factors contributing to the decision that the woman is the SAHP begins way before TTC.

I think the reason we are talking ironin boards etc, is because the OPs point is that if women make most of the purchasing decisions, then they should be the one making the products. Iyswim.

And yes you have a great point. I often get told I work in a Male dominated industry with shock, as though having a vagina means I can't be successful. The companies I work with have many more men working for them. Friends put it to me that I shouldn't open this business because of that. We shouldn't be bringing our daughters up with those trains of thoughts.

Men take a punt even if they don't. ABSOLUTELY - I advertised for a number of roles in my business a few years ago and in every case I had about 70% men and 30% women apply, but the men were almost entirely unqualified (the one guy who was qualified had a Twitter account all about his dream to apply for a - completely different - job during their next recruitment drive and that was all he wanted to do, ever - hey Mr. Ambitious, why not make your Twitter feed private?). The women were almost all completely qualified.

Although memorably (and I'm outing myself here, because I've told this gem before IRL), one young woman, a school leaver, said in her cover letter for a highly experienced book keeper role, that she had never tried book keeping, but liked maths at school, so she was sure she'd be very good at it. :) That's the spirit!

I think it's possible that women anticipate the dip in career trajectory after they have children, and lower their expectations earlier.

But it's like the trading thing in the article I posted above - men are more likely to take a punt, whether it's writing a CV or trading stock, and while the fact that women are more careful is advantage in many respects, we need to teach our daughters to stick their necks out from a very young age and not to be talked down, or told that little girls should be nice when the little boys in their class are running riot. My four year old has started identifying differences in the way girls and boys are playing, when 6 months ago they were playing happily alongside each other, so this is the point at which we can watch the language we use with them, and the ways we encourage them - be a smart-arse, be brave, jump off the highest wall and run faster than Oliver/Rafe/Sebastian.

But to what extent do board members influence product design? This is surely a separate issue to women at board level where the numbers are low.

On the highly sexist side though my house was designed by a bloke I have no doubt of that .

I think the reason we are talking ironin boards etc, is because the OPs point is that if women make most of the purchasing decisions, then they should be the one making the products. Iyswim.

I do, but I will definitely spend more money in this lifetime on financial products than I will on ironing boards. If women are actively better financial traders etc, then I will benefit more in life from women having higher ranking roles in the financial institutions I use.

I guess I'm also a bit dismissive of the ironing board thing (i.e. product design in general) because I believe that physical products that are badly designed will disappear simply because people won't buy them. Although if that is the case, it's a mystery that scented tampons are a thing, right? SOMEBODY is buying those abominations.

ALSO - among creative school leavers, girls seem to tend towards surface design degrees and boys towards product design. We'll have ironing boards designed by women if more of them study product design at university. It's not the fault of the Ironing Board Design Department HR manager.

Slightly OT, but my ironing board is Brabantia and was £100 about 10 years ago and it's bloody amazing. My Dad uses this shit spindly thing that was about £10 and won't buy a good one "because ironing boards are useless". Makes me want to scream. Maybe I'll buy him a Brabantia one for Christmas. He'd probably be thrilled.

Board members should have something to do with a product before launch.

Many products would be pitched, not all of them used.

I definitley agree with the men taking a punt comment. I am actually one of those, although I agree women in general don't. I have put myself forward for things that technically I should have. But I have and usually it's paid off.

I had my first child at 22 and never had the thought that career must spiral downwards, but then I never planned on being a sahm.

I am sure some women do think like that and, yes, it starts long before ttc. It's an interesting concept.

Not sure why it never occurred to me though.

I heart you, NaanBread!

I was playing with the Lego Friends hair salon with my 6yo this week. I "walked" up and said "hi, do you work here?" to her character.

She said:

"I own this business, I own several businesses, I own the swimming pool over there too"

Expectations!

That's not even great parenting by me, I think it's because her father (who is a sexist arsehole as it happens) owns his business - so it's normal for her.

If trading and board membership and business ownership are part of their expectations, their experience, they have more chance of considering that too.

We were talking about criminals and the court process the other day. What did I, a woman, a feminist say about the judge's role? Well, whatever I said, I caught myself by default saying HIM.

I can't criticise FTSE 350 boards until I get my own house in order and don't say HE automatically to senior roles in general talk.

Why did I say he?
Because that's what I see and hear in the media. It's hard, but we have to raise our boys and girls to see all doors open to them.

not totally agree. Products that aren't bought, will disappear. And yes who is buying scented tampons?

We do need to look at why girls lean towards certain things and not others. I do believe men and women are different, although there are expections. As we send men generally take a punt, where a woman doesn't.

If girls are leaning towards certain things because that's what they love to do, it's not an issue. If it's low level social conditioning, then it's is a problem.

I don't understand the thing about men applying for jobs even if they don't meet the criteria. I mean, I understand that they apply for them, but surely they don't get to be interviewed? How would you get to interview stage for a job where you don't actually meet the criteria?