Blog Posts

Six of the best: lockdown luxuriesMaybe we didn’t all define them as luxuries until experiencing restrictions on our lifestyles, but confinement compels us all to re-assess, right?Which of these are you missing most? Click here to let us know!Touch, companionship, friends/family gatherings (Detail from D&G Light Blue ad)“I need sex,” exclaims a vibrantly energetic woman in her seventies, frustrated and dispirited by the enforced hiatus in her social life. “I don’
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“It was definitely a thing, it was happening,” says a private jet pilot about reports of the wealthy hopping in their own ‘planes to escape the rapid global spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus. “They were flying off to their other residences. But it’s becoming more difficult.”That’s because even the luxury loopholes are closing worldwide as countries – including many in Latin America such as Costa Rica which are popular as second homes for the American wealthy – have already shut down or
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Controversial is our readers’ favourite category this month, with this ad getting a lot of attention, though we’re not sure whether that’s sparked by the notion of men being made to pay/tweet, or because of the current COVID 19-driven run on paper.“It made me laugh to see people ‘panic-buying’ loo roll in the supermarkets,” said our local café manager. “I was brought up in Estonia, in Soviet times.”She didn’t need to say more: I did a three-month student exchange in (then) Leningrad, wh
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We used to think of leather as a by-product of meat, particularly those of us who grew up in farming country. Now, the provenance of leathers used in luxury apparel and accessories, and in high-end vehicle interiors, is coming under a lot more scrutiny, with organisations like PETA reporting horrendous animal abuse in the global skin trade – as well as production processes that are harmful to individual workers and the environment. Behind the Leather
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The policeman, my landlord, some neighbours with their 11-year-old daughter and I surveyed the disarray in my burgled bedroom. I wondered if anybody's else's eye was going straight to the sex toy lying amidst the underwear that had been pulled out of drawers and tossed onto the floor.If they were, nobody commented.The colleague who'd driven me home took me straight out for a drink, and everyone else dispersed - no harm done, just a minor mess to clear up.But the image of the plain old dildo pluck
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London Fashion Week 2020 saw the opening of the event’s first Swap Shop; Victoria Beckham highlighting sustainability as a challenge that must be responded to in the notoriously wasteful fashion industry; and a group of us chipping in to buy a new kilt for a friend whose old one boasted almost more holes than cloth after incessant use at weddings, pubs and rugby matches.If you’re not getting the significance of the kilt, check out this animated Selfridges campaign at the British wool se
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Our prototype ADDS site went live shortly before the Brexit vote in 2016. Here are a few European ad campaigns, both hard-hitting and amusing, from non-UK countries in the EU that have caught our eye since.This ‘let them eat cake’ gender equality campaign out of Romania was one of the first, and the ‘Unquiet Voices’ campaign, also Romanian, made a powerful point about domestic violence and abuse (DVA) by superimposing the stories of real DVA survivors onto old black and white movies.Spain
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Photo by Mike from PexelsAdvertising has come a long way from the ‘Mad Men’ days: yes, it’s still about selling stuff, but it now plays a much larger role in holding up a mirror to society. The last decade in particular has seen several taboo-busting campaigns tackle those topics society finds difficult to discuss openly.Read on for our Top Six Taboo Topics we’re expecting to see more of in 2020.MenopauseOmg, seriously??? Yes, it’s really, really, REALLY hard to find any advertising at all around
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Every year we’re seeing more taboos – those topics we’re uncomfortable talking about as a society – being tackled in ads and brand marketing. Here’s a rundown of Six Silence-Breakers that caught our eye in 2019.Sexual diversityThis was the year that high-end fashion house Ralph Lauren – a hot favourite with conservative preppy types – featured a same-sex couple for the first time in one of their commercials, and fellow fashion label Calvin Klein sparked controversy among the LGBTQ co
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It’s the time of year when we’re being advised to moderate our alcohol and other intakes to avoid excess, so where’s the ‘consume responsibly’ label for North American actor-turned-advertiser Ryan Reynolds?The 43-year-old, who’s married to U.S. actress Blake Lively, has become ubiquitous this festive season, hitting different kinds of headlines on what seems like a daily basis as he forges his own unique genre of comedy and action.Netflix viewers may already be well aware of his new movie, ‘
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And why?Well, as the Christmas 2019 countdown begins - ever earlier, it seems - and our screens throb with food porn, fun, and sparkling gift ideas, Greenpeace serves up a reminder about the connection between meat consumption and the environment.'Climate emergency' was named as Word of the Year 2019 by Oxford Dictionaries, which defines the term as: "a situation in which urgent action is required to reduce or halt climate change and avoid potentially irreversible environmenta
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Wow, really? What's this all about?Following up on their recent 'Three Billboards' campaign highlighting lack of accountability in gender-related incidents among British MPs, (https://addvertising.org/boris-johnson-decision-sparks-three-billboards-reaction) the UK Women's Equality Party (WEP) has launched a further series of posters that drive a stiletto-thrust of black humour into the heart of British government and law-making, Westminster itself.The WEP asks why MPs facing unresolved alleg
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The ‘Swinging Sixties’ brought us a whole new era of sexual freedom thanks to oral contraception. Known as The Pill, it was approved in 1960 in the USA, and came to Britain in 1961 - though it could only be prescribed for married women until 1967, the same year homosexuality was decriminalised in the UK.Female sexuality soon began to take a new shape: This Noxcema shaving cream ad features a seductive blonde and the well-known striptease music, but maybe not in quite the way viewer
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Well, duh, you might be thinking - of course it is! Ah, but the devices originally billed as designed to help cigarette smokers quit or switch to something less harmful are now hitting the headlines themselves as causes of lung disease and death.In the USA, news of a dozen deaths and several hundred cases of lung disease - some of them teenage patients - have been linked to vaping, prompting calls for people to be discouraged from using e-cigarettes, vaping, juuling and similar until more informa
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?Alexa loses her voice? has become YouTube?s most-viewed ad of 2018, with over 50 million views. It?s fun, sassy and clearly effective - what?s not to like?Pithy, lol responses from Gordon Ramsay, Cardi B, Rebel Wilson and Anthony Hopkins made this Super Bowl ad an instant classic: Amazon's virtual assistant Alexa 'lost her voice' and had to be replaced by diverse celebrities who, well, just didn't have a clue how to answer the kind of demands routinely made of Alexa. So there?s no
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While it was one of the most-viewed Christmas 2018 ads here on ADDS, this saucy #ASTurnUpTheHeat campaign for luxury lingerie purveyor Ann Summers clearly got some people heated in a certain way: We ran a pop-up poster survey in a London co-working space and the body of one of the models featured in a still from the ad was covered with red 'sad' stickers.There's no way of knowing if this was the reaction of one person or several, so it's hard to draw any conclusions from it. But we still found it
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The world?s most famous doll is topping sales again, which some attribute to her brand re-positioning as a female empowerment tool. But isn?t that what she always was?U.S. company Mattel?s baby-boomer doll has taken a lot of flak for wrongful focus of little girls? aspirations, especially around her physical ?perfection?.However, an estimated billion Barbies have been sold since 1959, and she still brings in close on US$1 billion a year - it?s hard to argue with that figure even if you
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With a million plastic bottles bought every minute worldwide, according to The Guardian, and a billion going into our oceans the movement against single-use plastic is gathering momentum in the UK. London Mayor Sadiq Khan is pushing for water fountains across the capital for people to freshen up and fill up free of charge; and January 2018 saw Costa Coffee owner Whitbread leading the charge of companies signing up for the Refill campaign to offer similar stations on their premises.&nbsp
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If you've been in Spain at all recently, you may have seen this ad in store fronts for fashion designer Adolfo Dominguez.?S? M?s Viejo? (?Be More Old?) is the written message alongside a black and white image of a female model, hands deep in her elegant pockets, lines deep in her elegant face.?I love it, I really love it,? says a mature woman checking out the new season?s offerings in the shop window. ?It acknowledges that we?re not all young and perfect for ever, we?re just not.??The li
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If you?re into alternative rock, you?ve probably heard of him. If you?re into rock babes, he?s apparently becoming one. Now the Kaleo frontman lends his distinctive voice to conservation.Fans of Icelandic band Kaleo will recognise the soundtrack, 'I Can't Go On Without You' for this one-minute campaign by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), urging action to conserve endangered species.?I believe in preserving the natural world and its beauty," says lead vocalist and guitarist JJ, attributing
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