The beauty industry is an enormous industry that has continuously been scrutinized due to its advertising methods.  The industry is worth about 170 billion dollars globally; which is no surprise to anyone who watches television or drives past ad billboards.  Beauty products are advertised everywhere.  These products are designed to enhance or improve, primarily female consumers.

Photo editing and retouching practices are used regularly in any advertisement for enhancement, but when do such practices become too much? Is it ethical to portray digitally altered photos as the norm?

Huge companies in the beauty industry such as  Maybelline, Covergirl and Sephora all advertise in similar ways.  Photos that have been retouched and digitally edited to make  models look impossibly beautiful; which the company then claims is the result of using the advertised beauty product.  These pictures fill magazines, cover billboards and are all over the internet, giving girls an unattainable standard of beauty.

I find this advertising is misleading and unethical as it sends the wrong message to society.  Marketing should be a method to portray the value of a product to the consumer for the consumers benefit and thus the company’s benefit.  When things are not real, but consumers perceive them to be, marketing tactics can dangerously manipulate people’s perspectives.   This is shown in the high prevelency of eating disorders and depression in North America and other places where people are exposed to this type of media every day.

Dove is a beauty company that chooses to differentiate itself through its advertisements that promotes real women and real beauty in its “campaign for real beauty.”  This type of advertising can cause brand loyalty in a more ethical manner because what you see is not fake.  Whether this is a better marketing tactic or not, it portrays a more real image and therefore is the more ethical choice.

Marketing can greatly influence consumers as advertisements surround us in our day-to-day lives.  Therefore, marketers must consider the implications of their ad campaigns and  attract consumers to a product in an ethical way.  This will make the company more reputable and the consumer more knowledgable.

http://www.alternet.org/story/148140/the_cosmetics_racket%3A_why_the_beauty_industry_can_get_away_with_charging_a_fortune_for_makeup

http://www.dove.us/social-mission/campaign-for-real-beauty.aspx