Evolution (advertisement) - Background

Background

The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty was launched by Unilever in 2003, to coincide with the expansion of the Dove brand from soaps and other cleansing solutions to health and beauty products in general, including deodourants, shower gels, hair-care and skin-care products. The first stage of the campaign centred around a series of billboard advertisements, initially put up in the United Kingdom, and later worldwide. The spots showcased photographs of regular women (in place of professional models), taken by noted portrait photographer Annie Leibovitz. The ads invited passers-by to vote on whether a particular model was, for example, "Fat or Fab" or "Wrinkled or Wonderful", with the results of the votes dynamically updated and displayed on the billboard itself. Accompanying the billboard advertisements was the publication of the "Dove Report", a corporate study which Unilever intended to " a new definition of beauty will free women from self-doubt and encourage them to embrace their real beauty."

The series received significant media coverage from talk shows, women's magazines, and mainstream news broadcasts and publications, generating media exposure which Unilever has estimated to be worth more than 30 times the paid-for media space. Following this success, the campaign expanded into other media, with a series of television spots (Flip Your Wigs and the Pro-Age series, among others) and print advertisements ("Tested on Real Curves"), culminating in the 2006 Little Girls global campaign, which featured regional versions of the same advertisement in both print and screen, for which Unilever purchased a 30-second spot in the commercial break during Super Bowl XL at an estimated cost of US$2.5M.

In 2006, Ogilvy & Mather were seeking to extend the campaign further, by creating one or more viral videos to host on the Campaign for Real Beauty website. The first of these, Daughters, was an interview-style piece intended to show how mothers and daughters related to issues surrounding the modern perception of beauty and the beauty industry. It was during the production of Daughters that a series of short films entitled "Beauty Crackdown", of which Evolution was part, was pitched to Unilever as an "activation idea." The concept was one that art director Tim Piper, who proposed to create Evolution with the budget left over from Daughters (C$135,000), pushed. It was originally intended to get people to the Campaign for Real Beauty website to see Daughters, and to participate in the workshops featured on the site.