The marketing blog of Alex Meisner perfectly highlighted the unethical trend fashion marketers have chosen to use in recent years. No longer are they concerned about catchy slogans, but simply, more on who is hot enough to endorse the brand. The rising movement of “sex sells” combined with increasing social media usage has created an era of unwanted, uncensored, and degrading ad campaigns.
The technological advancement in today’s society has created a vast amount of outlets where marketers can reach consumers, including the obvious Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, at low costs. To some extent, the material posted on these social media sites can be censored to a younger audience via parental discretion. However, companies still notice that a large portion of sales are come from consumers seeing their poster advertisements plastered on bus stops and billboards.
While walking down Robson Street this past weekend, I caught a glimpse of an advertisement through a store’s window. No wonder it jumped out at me: the poster was of a nude man and woman with stencil drawings of an outfit covering them. This is the new advertising campaign the clothing brand FCUK has launched for their 2013 Fall collection. The UK company is well known for their risqué campaigns, but this one tops them all. Evidently targeting the young adult market, yet if I was as a parent, I would not want my child being exposed to such sexually explicit material so openly.
As Alex notes, when will the line be crossed? Every company wants to differentiate themselves from competition, but there needs to be another strategy taken. Recent marketing strategies taken by several retail companies have become tasteless and quite frankly, all too similar. Living in a world full of culture and diversity, sex should not still be the only thing that sells.
