H&M have already caused their usual ruckus with their new poster campaign for summer bathing fashions - featuring model Heidi Klum. Åke Finne, advertising professor in Sweden states "These ads are insulting to women, depicting them as hookers'. read more to see Heidi topless.
"The image is unappetizing. Heidi 'dares' to bare all, yet hides behind a pole, a pole that leads the thought to a stripper's dancing pole. Her underwear is so far down on her hips you don't know if she's about to take them off or on."
Catarina Midby, international press contact at H&M does not agree. "I believe that our customers can identify with the model. We've chosen her because she suits our bathing suits in the best possible way and stands for a healthy lifestyle" she said to BT newspaper.
The ads have not been reported to ERK (Ethical advertising in Sweden) or similar advertising watchdogs as of yet.
What do you guys think?
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Personally I don't think that one ad would make me buy any of their bathingsuits. What there is of the suit in the ad isn't my style I guess...I think it's rather ugly. But, I do find it amusing that they seem to think their customers identify with the model- chances are the consumers just want to look like her. And that's not identifying with her.
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PermalinkI like little bathing-shorts, though I wear mine in my size.... ;-) (that looks really cramped, even on a wee girl like Heidi.)
I never buy bathing suits from H&M though, so if I like the suit doesn't matter. I probably never will either. Cheap suits don't do me.
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Permalinkbefore anyone gets their knickers in a twist (heehee) - I'd like to add that the other shots from this campaign are quite nice (nostalgic seventies feel) and quite harmless. It's only this shot that is 'iffy'.
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Permalinki wouldn't have thought they intended to have her look like a stripper. wouldn't have crossed my mind unless pointed out.
and as far as the bottoms go, that style is starting to get more popular, my girlfriend loves em and i'd rather see those then the stupid G-Strings which are more revealing. i'm surprised that you were offended by that!
-jason
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Permalinkperhaps they intended it to be "subliminal"?
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Permalinkg-strings aren't as bad as micro-strings (link not safe for work...). I don't mind g-strings [my bikini is one]. Micro-bikini's seems a bit, uh, why not go nude, really?
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PermalinkStorm in a teacup - this is how H&M get more bang for their buck. I bet they are the ones who asked for the Quote from Åke Finne to begin with. The image is tame.
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PermalinkJ-H X! who wears that and considers themselves "dressed"???
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PermalinkGood point, Anonymous.
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PermalinkObviously Åke Finne doesn't know the difference between hookers and strippers! The latter dances around poles for money and a hooker...well a hooker dances around poles too...but wel...anyway....Gisele is neither a hooker nor an exotic dancer. She's a....you know, she dated Leo DiCaprio...maybe she is a hooker!
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PermalinkHow is this different from the SI swimsuit issue or anything else? The bamboo pole is clever, clever, clever...
This is nothing... I recently did, however, see a stripper-esque locally-produced tv spot for a Pittsburgh radio station (here you go, Claymore) that did offend the bejeezus out of me. Nothing like a cheap-looking bottle-blonde writhing around to Van Halen and other mullet-rock greats for thirty... the cable company production made seem even more like somebody's nasty home video.
Heidi looks like fresh-faced nun innocently frolicking in the surf (albeit one with a convenient bamboo pole) by comparison. And Prof. Finne, if she were a hooker on a tropical isle, don't you think her bottom would be clad in hula-print vinyl instead?
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PermalinkOn Norways National Holiday (17 may) H&M posters were vandalized all over town.
This might be unrelated though, they take their 'nasjonaldag' veeeeery seriously, with a party all day and evening. Posters did get vandalized, but nobody has filed a formal complaint about them in Norway.
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PermalinkIs it just me.. Or is this too one of those "scandals" you see every year when H&M release posters for Bikini's or underwear? (remember Anna Nicole? Pamela Anderson?)
Anonova reports that campaign is too popular
"But more than half of the posters have been stolen by fans and workers are having to be paid overtime to keep up with replacing them."
And some posters that have not been stolen also need to be replaced - as they have been damaged by feminists angry at what they see as sexist advertising.
Police in Cologne alone say they have 200 reports of smashed ad hoardings where glass or plastic has been removed to get at the posters of Klum, 29.
Hans-Peter Bischoff, 45, boss of the ad firm JC Decaux, said: "Every day more are broken open, and to try and stop the thefts we have promised to give away free posters.
"We put up 750 small posters that were all gone or vandalised within a few hours. It's madness."
Posters are already changing hands for up to £20 a time on the internet auction site Ebay.
I think I heard this one before. But hey, if it ain't broke - Don't fix it!
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