Have you seen the new Bodyform advert?

[Fairenuff]

Just that really. Sorry if there's already a thread.

www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/bodyform-s-new-advert-breaks-period-advertising-taboos/vi-BB16hTmF?ocid=msedgdhp

I have suffered from that - as a teen I used to take tablets and had endemetriosis investigations. Doesn’t mean I enjoy it when a global company uses that experience to try and ‘connect’ with people to sell product

Wow that’s powerful. Love it or hate it there’s no denying it’s powerful.

Of course adverts are money driven.

Women have money. We are just running out of places to spend it.

So a timely ad like this comes along and it's a great big breath of fresh air.

For some of us it's like we are drowning in a sea of gaslights so it's just so refreshing to just be unashamedly acknowledged for our biology that unites women through time and culture.

We're happy to spend our money to show our appreciation of this and hopefully more advertisers will notice and realise that they can't just airbrush women out of their biological realities.

I’m delighted with this. It’s entirely as it should be- women’s reproductive issues should be talked about and acknowledged.

Breaking down taboos starts with the understanding that something is normal. If we can teach girls and boys (and men!) that periods are a normal bodily function then we are on the road to breaking down those taboos.

I think this video is far more effective at normalising periods than that awful recent advert from tampax.

It just makes a change to see an advert for women, focusing on actual women and their biology, which takes up a huge amount of time in a woman's life.

Instead of how to make your legs smoother, body thinner, eyelashes thicker, carpet cleaner, and food tastier.

@HoneysuckIejasmine

They could have just made them 10p cheaper than their competitors and improved sales that way. But they've taken time to actually think about it

No they couldn’t, that’s the point. Discounting for sales in fmcg is done routinely and they’re already cheaper than the brand leader. Currently the buzz is around driving brand connection via emotion - so they’ve had a think about what will appeal to a certain audience and made an ad about it. It won’t help anyone as it won’t be broadcast on TV, only people like us will see it

Wow that is brilliant. Made me sad for being menopausal! So powerful.

Also I just looked up the credits and the ad was created by a man!

@Randomfires

I thought that was awful.....it was like ‘women’s issues by numbers’.

I don’t find my womb or having periods traumatic. This seems to implicate everyone does

Lucky you.

It's great to see an advert that acknowledges all the things that can happen throughout a woman's life and that periods and everything that goes with it isn't sorted by wearing an artificially scented pad.

'Their only desire - and their brief to the creative agency - will be to increase sales.'

Well yes of course. Which is why we were all so surprised that The Body Shop didn't seem to know this.

Exactly.

It's quite extraordinary that companies who specifically make products, either exclusively, or largely, for women, are telling women to shut the fuck up because a handful of men want them to.

How many times have we pointed out how unutterably stupid it is, a la Gerald Ratner? Stupid and misogynistic. As though women have so little power they have no choice but to be treated like dirt.

Maybe, just maybe, certain companies don't actually have a clue quite how exponentially they could increase their sales, if they genuinely appealed to women.

Excellent advert, very moving in every way!

I thought that was awful.....it was like ‘women’s issues by numbers’.

Don't care.

At a time when agreeing with the idea that women's issues exist can get you sacked, it is a relief that they aren't carefully pretending that nobody knows who gets periods.

Currently the buzz is around driving brand connection via emotion - so they’ve had a think about what will appeal to a certain audience and made an ad about it.

And they've got it right.

Why are you so against this.

All advertisers try to do this - John Lewis, etc. - but some miss the mark and others just piss of their intended audience so what's the problem with this advert aimed at women in an attempt to get women to buy their products? If you ask me it's working.

Women who buy sanitary products have to get them from someone so why not from the brand that acknowledges the biology around reproduction which is, after all, the whole reason we have periods in the first place.

I am hard as nails and hugely cynical about stuff like this usually. I cried.

Bloody well done Bodyform (no pun intended).

They asked women to share stories about their wombs and then made the ad.

Good, as long as they say they are for women I’ll chuck em in the shopping. Always might want to have a think on reading the responses here.

Yes, all of that. Bloody well done, pun intended.

And if the misogynistic crap starts - inclusion is about addition, not replacement, and not everything has to be about everyone. You don't erase the 99% of reality to make it all about the 1% unless you're part of the problem women have of not being allowed to talk about their periods or the biological realities of being female. The experience of female people isn't a dirty secret or naughty to talk about.

The message we get from the Always product and branding is - menstruators, you smell.

It's not really comparable is it

@Fairenuff you’re right it is good that we can see ads that represent women and don’t shy away from our stories.

It just winds me up that loads of people have said that this ad will make them buy the product as I just feel that making an ad isn’t really supporting women and they feel like their job is done. I’d like to see them doing something practical to support women’s issues/ causes considering we’re the whole customer base! Saying something is a start. Doing something is better

women’s bodies and emotions to truly represent their sensations and feelings that we believe are not only invisible but ignored, overlooked or denied

Refreshing.

I had to explain to a board room of men last week, discussing office toilets, why women required sanitary provisions. Simply hadn’t even occurred to them. Red face all round (except mine, I quite enjoyed watching them wriggle about).

Might send them this ad!

@Randomfires Apart from this ad, one thing Bodyform is doing to help women and girls is donating pads etc to charities that help ameliorate period poverty.

I thought this was hugely moving - i cried too. I have written to body form and told them how brilliant it is. I appreciate what they have done, this is our biological reality, our challenges and highs and lows - I am going to show my daughters, as they are well on their way through puberty, no periods yet but this is actually a really useful discussion piece.

Will it not be on telly?

I disagree with pp who said it would be scary for girls. I would show it to my dd so she knows the range of possible experiences there are for women in relation to their reproductive system. She's only a baby though.

You must be very lucky to have experienced none of the negatives shown.

Wow! Powerful and empowering.

I cried. I have endometriosis, I have the laparoscopy scars from my 3 surgeries. I am in agony sometimes. When I was 25 they put me on hormone blockers so I was temporarily menopausal and so the hot flushes were relatable too. They asked for women's stories and represented them clearly. I know it's marketing, but marketing has never made me feel seen before. I'll be using bodyform in the future