Dove continues its campaign for Real Beauty launching a new series of ads dedicated to women in their fifties. The campaign is called Pro Age and aims at generating the same level of buzz of the previous effort with this approach. This time Dove decided to challenge the common view of ageing.

As a woman I surely appreciate this approach to communication, however this time I feel it isn't as sincere as in the campaign with size 32/33 women. The Pro Age site features a wide section dedicated to "Join the debage" starting from the question "can a woman be beautiful ad any age?". Well, as in the case of virals (where you can't send out a press release saying "we've launched a viral", because it's the audience who will decide if that video is really a word of mouth driver) I don't think you can launch a campaign and immediately state "this is a controversial ad, what do you think". So I've found so fake and irrealistic the twist they've decided to give to the campaign... there's even a competition (!!!) "Tell us what beauty after 40 means to you and help us show society that your later years can be the best ones. You could appear in a new campaign for Dove Pro Age products.".

Well, if I think about it a little bit more I don't know why I'm so annoyed. After all, it's advertising. It's not supposed to be sincere...

...but at least it should be coherent. I fully agree with you. for me it is like the old men in the new cars. they've taken the different elements from the previous campaign, mold it a little and voilla - the new campaign is ready. it can't work as it is not sincere at all..

Posted by: Daria at February 13, 2007 07:03 AM

I blogged about some dire stuff that Dove are doing in the UK. They are basically asking women to fill in a survey for "real women to share thoughts and ideas" but basically it just asks you to answer banal questions like Dove Makes Me Feel Confident About My Underarms. Take a look, would love to get your thoughts
http://ameliatorode.typepad.com/life_moves_pretty_fast/2007/02/dove_real_beaut.html

Posted by: amelia at February 14, 2007 10:33 AM

I'm 48. I loved the commercial, went to the site, and now plan on putting my big, fat baby boomer wallet where my mouth is. I'm switching to Dove and am happy to support their campaign for beauty. Of course I'm not naive enough to think this is a philanthropic program - it's a company using an ad campaign to make money. That said - it's about time women over 50 were not marginalized and de-sexualized, so I'm happy to help make Dove rich - and just possibly these kind of images will boost women's self esteem and make us all reflect on what is really beautiful.

Posted by: Adriane at February 17, 2007 06:22 AM