Dove: Making More Women Feel Beautiful Every Day
The Dove Brand has long been seen as a promoter of beauty, producing products that have to be able to compete in the highly competitive "beauty market." Now Dove is going a step further challenging "the beautiful" with claims that "grey is gorgeous, fifty is fabulous", and "overweight is outstanding." Silvia Lagnado, the brand director for Dove has been at the head of Dove's new "Campaign for Beauty" which has the "simple mission to make more women feel beautiful everyday." Dove's approach is different in that they want to get to the facts on beauty; what it is and what makes women feel like they possess it. How are they doing this? Through normal, real women who are beautiful in normal, real ways.The Myth of "Beauty"
The home page of Dove.com shows a picture of a young girl and states: "She thinks she's ugly, lets help her change her mind." The first step in changing minds is to dispel the myths, stereotypes, and preconceived notions about beauty for both women as well as our worldly "beauty" culture. Dove created a panel of researchers who pooled their results to determine what women really think about beauty and what they really need to feel beautiful. Do women constantly fuss over their physical appearance? Is this the major factor in a woman's self-confidence and sense of beauty? Pop-culture may say yes but Dove and its studies say no. While the majority of the "beauty" market lures clients by convincing them they have the secret to beauty, Dove claims that women already have it. Dove's innovative campaign provides them with the key element to any business: unique differentiation from their competition that draws on positive aspects of consumer behavior. Dove is distancing themselves from the "frustrating beauty genre that just depresses women."
Dove Campaign for Beauty: The Real Beautiful Woman
The definition of beauty as seen in films and magazines generally comes in the form of a retouched photo of a woman with long hair, exotic eyes, and dazzling abs and thighs. The message being sent is that beauty is limited to a few select elite, it requires a lot of prestige, and it can only be obtained by shelling out thousands of dollars to reconstruct your physical self. For years Dove has been complicit in projecting this image as well. However, all of that's changing now. Dove claims that beauty has been defined by narrow, stifling stereotypes for too long, and women are finally saying that it's time to change the media's representation of beauty. What Dove emphasizes in their research is that they're discovering what women are really looking for, not just what society perceives they look for. What they've found is that real beauty comes in many shapes, sizes, and ages. Dove wants every woman to feel that beauty is within her reach, and do this by presenting a wider definition of beauty than is currently available. This is why Dove is launching the Campaign for Real Beauty, that manifests itself in a report called The Dove Report: Challenging Beauty.
This report was produced by a unique team of educators, thinkers, and research groups with the goal of finding out what beauty really means. This democratic research approach has created compelling results that reveal the real values of our society, and dispel the myths of a limited aesthetic. What Dove has come up with is a definition of beauty that is both optimistic and realistic; and embraces the philosophy that a woman's individual looks, shape, size, and spirit are what real beauty is made of. Dove's findings assert that individuality is what really makes someone attractive, rather than a universal definition for "beautiful."
In surveying 3,000 women, Dove found that only 2% of those they interviewed saw themselves as beautiful, with over 90% considering themselves average. Dove wants to change this destructive attitude, and sees the desperate need to expand people's notions of beauty. Dove's ultimate goal is to create a cultural shift in women's definitions of beauty that will free them from self-doubt and encourage them to embrace real beauty. They assert that all women possess the key to beauty in some form or another; and Dove is helping to facilitate this recognition.
In this study, researchers dug deep to find out when women feel the most beautiful. What Dove reveals is fascinating: beauty is most often determined for women from the "inside" or character, and not exclusively from the outside appearance. This conclusion aims at setting the record straight: our culture is not as obsessed with physical perfection as we think. The media misrepresents how people really feel, portraying a fake, false image of what we want.
Redefining What's Most Important: The Real Woman
So how do women define "inner beauty" and why is it the most important element in having a "beautiful" life? Dove discovered that physical beauty is not necessarily the first thing on a woman's mind when she gets up every day. Rather, in rating the most important values in life, women consistently rated marriage, friendships, and spirituality above feeling attractive and looking beautiful. All of these findings are geared toward the "discovery of self" on a deeper level than wrinkle-free skin or having the "perfect" body. Dove's campaign recognizes that life keeps changing, and that we need to continually reassess how we live our lives. It's about being mindful of our lives-about feeling good in our skin, which is ultimately what feeling beautiful is all about.
A major factor for feeling good was determined to be relationships with others. Among the women surveyed, a great majority expressed that they feel most secure with their beauty when they are in a meaningful relationship with someone, whether it be a friend, family member, or spouse. "Inner" beauty or "spirituality" is also very influential for women. A majority of the women questioned agreed that beauty comes from a woman's "spirit" and love of life, not from her looks. Most women felt beautiful when they were participating in a meaningful experience like helping others, spending time with children, and being physically active. Surprisingly, activities that were devoted to "becoming more beautiful" like shopping and looking at magazines were the least likely to make a woman feel beautiful.
Dove's global Campaign for Real Beauty aims to change the status quo and offer in its place a broader, healthier, and more democratic view of beauty; a view of beauty that all women can own and enjoy everyday.
The Most Vulnerable: Helping Teenagers With Their Beauty Qualms
Whether it's size 2 models or movie stars with exceptional curves, beauty pressures for girls are everywhere. And when young girls find it hard to keep up, low self-esteem can take over leading to introversion, withdrawal from normal life, and wasted potential. A recent survey in the United Kingdom indicated that 6 out of 10 girls thought they'd "be happier if they were thinner." The mid teenage years (including high school and junior high) are defining moments for young teenage girls. Looking beautiful and feeling comfortable with oneself were found to be two of the most important issues for high school girls. Dove created the Dove Self Esteem Fund as an agent of change that educates and inspires girls to have a wider definition of beauty. Guided by a panel of experts including psychologists, a photographer, multi-racial authors, researchers, and women's health care officials, the Fund is equipped to reach a huge audience of young women with beauty-concerns. One of the ways Dove sponsors this effort is by creating self-esteem workshops for young girls that help them foster a healthy relationship with their bodies and their looks.
The Self Esteem Fund supports specific charitable organizations to help foster self-esteem in a number of different countries. In the United States, Dove partners with the Girl Scouts of America in a program called uniquely ME! The program uses activity booklets and simple exercises to help build self-confidence in girls age 8-14. The program has already reached more than 138,000 girls in the US and Puerto Rico, and focuses on underserved communities.
The program consists of an educational curriculum that integrates the latest findings from the Girl Scout Research Institute along with hands-on activities like mentoring, community service, and sports. Three activity booklets, in English and Spanish, target two developmental age groups: 8-10 and 11-14 year-olds. Delivered by caring adult volunteers, uniquely ME! recognizes one's strengths, coping with peer pressure, identifying core values and personal interests, eating disorders, the power of positive thinking, relationships, and stress.
Why is a young woman's self image such a pressing issue? Research results from the National Association of Self-Esteem assert that self-esteem directly impacts the lives of adolescent girls. Pundits agree that a lack of self-esteem is directly related to the fact that 90% of eating disorders are found in girls, 58% of girls admit to dieting, 1 million girls under the age of 18 get pregnant annually, and 30% of adolescent girls have thoughts about suicide. These statistics are staggering and require immediate attention. Dove is responding, helping by refiguring their ad campaign, funding programs, and educating people on true self worth. Their goals are quite lofty: to change the lives of as many girls and woman as possible by offering the truth about beauty and enabling these individuals to reach their full potential. Research shows that in spending just three minutes looking at a fashion magazine, self-esteem is lowered for an incredible 80% of women! Although Dove can't change the advertising industry over night, they are taking responsibility for their area of influence by presenting real representations of beautiful women in their advertising. Not only is Dove putting more authentic faces in their ads, but they are showing women the reality of fashion advertising, emphasizing that the images we see are influenced by artificial lighting, touch-ups and more. Dove's new campaign is empowering the individual through self-esteem, and pitting their brand against the manipulative field of traditional beauty products.
So . . . What Does This Mean for the Business?
After the initial introduction of their campaign in Europe, Dove's sales reportedly doubled in the UK. People are drawn to a beauty company that is actively helping out the community and establishing itself as a positive trendsetter in the industry. The key here is that Dove is evolving their business into something more than a cosmetic outlet, thereby providing a healthy customer experience. Exceeding their expectations, Dove surpassed the $1 billion mark in global sales for 2004 and gained between $60 million and $70 million in lotion sales in the first year since the launch of Campaign for Real Beauty. Dove is a great example of a company who found an opportunity to invest in the needs of the consumer.
http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/
http://www.dove.us/