Culture Jam of Nine West Ad
ORIGINAL AD
This ad from shoe retailer Nine West was part of a campaign that ran in all 600 of its stores and in magazines. It targeted women aged 25 to 49 and was one of three “occasion-themed marketing” advertisements. Other occasions included “First Day of Kindergarten” and “Anticipatory Walk of Shame”. The ads are clearly meant to be edgy – Nine West’s senior VP of marketing was quoted as saying:
“The ads take on a traditional strategy of suggesting occasions for shoes, but with an extra added flair. ‘We have to change the way we talk about occasions because women are modern now and shop for a different reason,’ Szychowski told the New York Times. Styles in “Starter husband hunting,” for example, might once have been called night-on-the-town shoes”. (1)
This ad and Szychowski’s last statement promote a consumer mentality. This mentality suggests that people must have a product for every want/need– even finding a life partner. The ad implies that buying shoes are enough to attract a husband as long as you have on a cute dress, decent makeup and a less attractive “wing woman” to talk to him. There is no mention of a woman’s intellectual capability. This ad also revisits some oft-repeated stereotypes about gender and relationships. It is heteronormative in assuming that all women are looking for a “Mr. Right. It demeans men by implying that they are prey, rather than individuals who willingly want to get married. Nine West also suggests that to catch these men, women only need be physically attractive.
The “Starter Husband” title also plays on the ‘gold digger’ trope. The aspiring young woman looking to move up in social standing, should buy Nine West shoes and be attractive so she can marry a rich man, as her first husband. It is implied that this woman would then keep using her beauty to marry for money. With this view, women are incapable of being breadwinners or financially supporting themselves. Though Nine West is attempting to appeal to the modern woman, they are using very outdated ideas about women to do so. Ads like these contribute to the erasure of LGBTQ women and reinforce other harmful societal beliefs.
MY JAMMED AD
With my jamming philosophy, I wanted to subvert the original ad’s idea that women must hunt for a husband. I also wanted to expose some of the other archaic tropes used. I recognize that the ad was supposed to be tongue-in-cheek but the stereotypes employed are still harmful. For my culture jam, I took their metaphor of hunting even further. I erased all text from the original ad, except for the title of “Starter Husband Hunting”. I then added my own ad copy, approximating the style and description of a hunting expedition.
The first couplet reads, “Prey: Rich Man. Any Rich Man.” I intended for this line to play on the heteronormative gold digger trope and expose the idea that women see men as a golden ticket to better living. My next line is, “Recommended Bait: Hot Woman. Cute Shoes Required.” This line indicates that women are both bait and hunter in this scenario. Patriarchy relegates attractive women to be simply shiny lures for men. But women who are aware of this “power” become hunters and use their beauty to ensnare men. I added “Cute Shoes Required” to subvert and poke fun at the original ad’s capitalist sentiment that shoes are all that women need to get their man.
With the couplet, “Typical Winnings: Semi Long Term Commitment,” I take aim at the “Starter Husband Hunting” title. The word Starter implies that this will be the first of multiple marriages for the target consumer. The ad seems to applaud divorce as long as it’s for the purpose of social climbing. I added the last line, “Expedition Price: $99.99 – $109.99” because that was the retail price of the shoe. The price also juxtaposes the relatively low cost of buying this shoe with the magnitude of choosing a partner. North American culture, teaches us that love is priceless, yet capitalism also tells us that it can be bought for the right amount of money. I want my culture jam to reveal the injustice of simplifying gender, relationships and women down to such inaccurate, sexist and capital-driven stereotypes.
References