I’ve noticed that Mr.Clean has lost weight. This dawned on me as I sat and watched TV this weekend. Mr. Clean had slimmed down, and as I watched, concerned that I had noticed his decreasing waist line, I couldn’t also help but notice his co-star. The commercial centered around Mr.Clean and his abilities to make this woman’s kitchen sparkle brighter than ever before. She was extremely celebratory over this accomplishment – as though her entire life she had dreamed of the day where she would find a solution for her dulling kitchen counters. As I continued to watch TV, waiting for my movie to come back on, the commercials seemed to pick up a certain theme. They were all somehow focused around women, which might have had to do with the fact that the movie that was currently playing was Legally Blonde. As I watched a women throwing herself at John Stamos (Uncle Jesse from Full House) as he held a cup of yogurt, I began to realize that women, according to the advertising industry, love to clean, be skinny, eat yogurt, and are dissatisfied with the length of their eyelashes.
After the third yogurt commercial about women being rushed away to far off places as they eat their spoonful of yogurt, I teased my roommate’s boyfriend stating that obviously according to this – men aren’t allowed a healthy digestive system. Although we giggled (because the joke wasn’t funny enough for a full out laugh) it did make me wonder how often certain products that are not gender focused, focus on one gender.
Taking a look at certain products, you can see that clear gender lines are drawn. For example, I could not name a cleaning commercial that centered on a man. The story lines around these commercials are always the same, a women is struggling to clean a mess that is too difficult to tackle. So a magical cleaning product allows her to not only clean up the mess, but clean up the mess with time to spare (to cook and care for the children, obviously). Aside from cleaning commercials, the amount of advertisements that focus on weight loss for women was just as daunting; Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Sensa, Special K and the list goes on. On the flip side, the commercials that focused on men were ones that promoted shoes and athletic gear, Doritos, cars, beer and cable.
According to an article about gender roles in advertising, advertisers hope to create a connection between a product and a person. This connection helps the advertiser promote the product, in the hopes that the product will eventually promote itself. For example, if cleaning products focus on stay at home moms, eventually these moms will promote the products to their friends. The article goes on to state how advertisements do not just sell products, they sell ideas, values, and identities. By selling these bigger and broader ideals, the advertisers can target different groups and mold stereotypes in order to better brand their product.
Let’s say your product is athletic gear, there is already a type of consumer you can concentrate on – the not so manly man that wish to personify athletes and the buff guy at the gym. By making your advertisement about pushing yourself to your limits (workout wise) and in the end still looking extremely attractive – these men may be persuaded to assume that the men that workout and are athletic, wear this product. Now this may seem almost laughable, a person being so easily persuadable, but this isn’t a one-time occurrence – one commercial doesn’t change a person’s mind. It’s the constant bombardment of these commercials over and over and over again.
As we continued to watch TV, a commercial for a new eyeliner came on and one of my friends squealed, ‘oh my gosh watch this commercial, I want this eyeliner, it looks so cool’. Wait, this eyeliner is so cool?? The excitement that was earned from this commercial made us laugh (this time a full out laugh, because it was so ridiculous that it deserved a laugh). Perhaps if my friend was in the store and saw the product she would not have voiced her excitement so loudly, maybe it had to do with the fact that the model in the commercial quickly drew her eyeliner and then proceeded to cat walk dramatically across a white backdrop as the camera captured her in crazy cut away shots. The effect of the commercial left you wanting to jump up and use such an eyeliner that allowed you to quickly have your makeup done so that you can go out and have the time of your life – if their focus group was young women who love to get done up and have a good time, they hit it right on the head.
*Disclaimer: Not all commercials are so gender specific, and I am in no way bashing the advertising industry*
But sitting and watching an hour and a half of TV will open your eyes up to how blatantly certain commercials push certain stereotypes. There is no clever pun, or one-liner, or double entendre. It is straight forward – this is a product that this type of person should be using, and sometimes the commercials even insinuate that if you are this type of person and are not using the product, then you are not measuring up to your full potential.
With that being said, excuse me while I go finish my yogurt. I have to start getting ready for the day, and it takes me at least 15 minutes to do my makeup.
ShoutOut! James Madison University 
this idea that you have written about is something that I often find myself worrying about. I think that it is almost scary to think the thoughts and ideas that are put in our heads, and we may not even know it! If we make ourselves aware of the media and their overpowering brain washing, then maybe things would go down differently!
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This is an awesome post!
To me, this subject is a double edged sword insofar as I want my ads to reach the right target audience, but I also don’t want to contribute to stereotypes. It’s a balancing act that’s never quite perfect but can be done without pulling from one to focus on the other, and it starts with advertisers seriously focusing on the messages they are projecting to their audience.
Personally, it frustrates me that products consistently market to one group of people; excuse me Jamie Lee Curtis, why shouldn’t digestive regularity be a concern of my growing body, especially after all the junk I put into my body? Humor aside, it infuriates me that marketers resolve to use cheap selling techniques to push out products in ads that only affirm stereotypes; Axe are women really so concerned with personal presentation that they will literally throw themselves at me if I use your crappy body spray? At what point will “sex sells” become cliche? Can we also please remember other countries are watching what we’re watching and are judging the US accordingly?
This dilemma is perfectly summed up when you said, “Advertisements do not just sell products, they sell ideas, values, and identities. By selling these bigger and broader ideals, the advertisers can target different groups and mold stereotypes in order to better brand their product.”
I personally believe advertisers and marketers need to be more conscious about the underlying messages they are sending out. Sales doesn’t need to be an all-inclusive array of politically and socially correct blandness, but it should be responsible and try to avoid stereotypes where they can and attempt diversity in selling a product. I for one live and die by my cleaning products and would like to see Mr.Clean helping out another man clean house!
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