Women’s retail clothing brand Reitmans has launched a new summer campaign with agency partner Taxi, sending a message to women to be more spontaneous, and that beauty more about attitude than a certain look.
“Forget the rules for five seconds,” prompt the 30- and 15-second TV spots, which feature a woman jumping in to help a policeman direct traffic (instead of just stopping traffic with her looks? Clever), a female jogger running after a male with a nice butt and a woman making faces into a security video camera. The ad features Eartha Kitt’s upbeat tune, “I Want To Be Evil.”
The playful, down-to-earth campaign — which notably features a plus-size model in a fresh coral lip shade — sees Reitmans continuing to explore its unfussy, accessible image while renewing its aim for a younger, more fashion-focused target market.
The online video has been seen and shared about 20,000 times on Reitmans’ Facebook and YouTube channels in the past 10 days or so, without an official push, according to Taxi.
“Beauty is more about attitude rather than the shape of a body,” says Pascal De Decker, executive creative director and general manager at Taxi. “It’s not about being 25 and blonde and skinny. We kept their signature, ‘Fits Your Beautiful,’ and asked, ‘What do we mean by being beautiful?’ It’s about being spontaneous and forgetting the rules for a few seconds. We know today women have lots of pressure — you have to be the perfect mom, cook, psychologist, lover, gardener, etc. It’s hard to be yourself when you have all those rules.”
Taxi, which has had a relationship with Reitmans going back a decade or so, was behind the retailer’s acclaimed campaign that featured a cravat-wearing fashion gurus Armand and Albert, and pitted the brand’s practical clothing against haute couture. But despite the beloved campaign, the store had a largely mature, 60+ clientele. Over the past two years, says De Decker, Reitmans has been trying to expand its target market into the 35+ region.
“Their previous position was about being comfy in your clothing, wearing what you need to live your life and not to be gorgeous all the time,” he adds. Now, they want to remind people that they are a fashion store, too — all while getting back the sense of humour of those guru ads.
“It brings you a little smile,” says De Decker. “It’s different from the fashion industry, where the models mostly have a long face and look super serious.”
Talk about trying to have it all.
