XX-XY Athletics brand launch. A brand claiming to stand for women - but what do women think about it?

A very ambitious brand for women has just launched, called XX-XY Athletics. On first glance the brand ethos seems clear as a bell. It's (almost) even spelled out in the name itself: XX-XY Athletics. As the brand founder Jennifer Sey puts it, this brand is "The only athletic brand that stands up for women's sports."

Anyone who has paid any attention to Adland® (as in this site, not the industry at large), and most "grown up" social media, as well as the news these past few years, knows that there has been an actual vacuum appearing in certain brand categories. That's where this idea - a women's athletic brand that supports women athletes - kind of seems like a given. Naturally, it was always a given that a women's brand would be about women, but everything has gone wrong since Harambe was shot and that Mayan calendar failed, so these days up is actually down.

So it is terrific that someone created the product for the clear market that has appeared. I applaud Sey for doing this.

"Throughout my life I’ve risked my reputation and standing in my community to stand up for children, women and free speech. XX-XY Athletics is the culmination of everything I’ve ever done in my life," says Sey, one of the founders of xx-xy.

The celebrity faces included in this brand are athletes Riley Gaines and Paula Scanlan, as well as
Chloe Cole, the “detransitioner” and children’s advocate. Anyone who has even peeked at gendercritical Twitter will be well familiar with these names, and how these women are fighting for children's rights and keeping women's sports for women only. Also on the team are Adam B. Coleman, author of “Black Victim to Black Victor,” Speaking Wrong at the Right Time and founder of Wrong Speak Publishing, and Dr. Tabia Lee, co‐ Founder of Free Black Thought and advocate for viewpoint diversity.

I've written about Sey before when she turned down a million dollar severance, as she was literally fired from her job at Levis for - omygoshhhh - running her mouth in a Substack post about her opinions on how San Fransisco school system dealt with masking mandates and how it may affect everyone's children.

In the years before Covid, and since, the term "cancel culture" has come for a lot of people. It does indeed seem like she was let go due to "not meeting our values" and other discreet ways of making people leave for having the gall to hold their own independent opinions. Don't you know friendo, that we should all be robots? Keep up.

At the time, it seemed a given that the woman who had worked her way from being a highly skilled Olympic gymnast into the role of Brand President was untouchable. But her prompt outing revealed it wasn't so. Nobody is.

So with that said, let's watch the brand launch video - and let's discuss our gut reactions after that. Ready?

This ad is a rallying cry for people to "stand up." Okay. My first question is what are you actually doing for women, here?

As far as production goes, the needle drop cello-drama feels like it's forcing an emotion rather than letting the words do the heavy lifting. Then we have our dear voice over girl who seriously needs to sort her sinuses out. It's a good read, but we can hear and if you want to sound professional, do a Neti pot before recording a voice-over.

Production skills aside, the ad just doesn't rouse me - and I am the one who should be roused. It kind of just made me wonder what are they actually doing. But hey at least I'm curious. So I went to the website and checked out their stuff. Job done! Right?

Not quite! The website provided no information on how they are standing up for women beyond telling us they are. How would my purchase of a $110.00 jogger support women's sport? No idea. Where are these things made? No idea. Am I supporting a cash grab that is re-selling cheap slave labor items here, or am I supporting women, in women's sports? Again, no idea.

And then there's the whole XY part. I get it, men are accountable too in this world and should be included because lord, they are "girl dads" and care. I've always retched at the "boy mom" and "girl dad" thing. For one thing, it's cringe. For another it's because as a parent I truly do not care what sex a kid has. All parents are happy as long as their offspring have all their senses and ten fingers, ten toes - give or take. The little helpless larva aka bundle of joy is everything to a parent, rocket-poops, sudden puke and all. Also I can get a Girl Dad shirt from hundreds of cheap print-to-order sites for years.

It would be different if this was 80 or 100 years ago. My grandfather was stationed at the border to Russia during WW2, and he framed the telegram that he received when my mother was born: "Congratulations on your firstborn. You will receive two days travel permission to see your wife and child despite it being a girl." it read. Despite!

And, yes, I know that I am a massive nerd who was socially rejected for years due to cartoonish braces, but did nobody at the table bring up klinefelters syndrome when making a logo containing XXY in a row like that? Just me? Ok. Did anyone raise the point about XXX being porn? No? You need to get out on the internet more. Go touch some DNS.

Jennifer Sey, above is the co-founder of XX-XY Athletics pictured wearing a "Just SEY it" t-shirt. As in Just Do It. Right? The impression this gives is that it is and ego-driven brand.  Fair enough, but my question is why would you want to remind people of Nike, your juggernaut competitor?

There is also a three-minutes plus launch film. Now, like most people, my attention span caps out at 90 seconds. It takes something really good to make me watch beyond that. Unfortunately, I started zoning out around twenty seconds. To be fair, I do that with almost every commercial I see and every case study ad when I'm judging awards too and I've sometimes judged a thousand of them in one day. But whether you work in advertising or whether you are a consumer, the lesson remains the same and always has since even before social media: you have to grab the audience's attention fast. If you don't, they're not going to stick with you.

Remember, the consumer is never interested in what you have to say unless you make the interested. They have to get the little kids ready for school. They have to pay bills. They have to remember to get that oil change, to call their great aunt to wish her a happy birthday and sign all of the teenager's school slips while making sure that they have a moment to "just chill" with them to make sure they are actually okay and not just saying that they are.

There's a reason why we keep quoting the Here's To The Crazy One's brand manifesto. It set the standard, for better or worse, and nothing has come close to it since. At best it's a rallying cry. At worst, it's a wank. This one falls somewhere in the middle. If anything, it feels like a retread of something Dove did ten years ago.

You know when teenagers cringe because you are trying too hard? That's the feeling that is overwhelming me here.

Your athletic brand is showing me leggings, with Riley Gaines as a model. I've met her, she told me that she kept training during covid by swimming up and down the Cumberland river - which is incredibly badass for any athlete.

But despite the athletes involved, this isn't performance wear but athleisure wear. So this isn't stuff that you are meant to sweat in. It's stuff to wear during your lazy mimosa Sunday brunch

So why is this brand?

"World class brands inform and drive the culture. Right now, there are no brands that give consumers the opportunity to weigh in on this subject. If we give them a way to say I stand with women and girls, I believe they’ll take it and join us because they’ll know they won’t stand alone," said Sey.

Actually, there are a couple of pro-women athleisure-wear brands. One is called xx-xy chromosomes. The difference between the mission statements is minimal, and the execution of it is money, as the latter has no "celebrities."

There is also another brand called Yakkem Apparel whose mission it is to "create a community of like-minded individuals who prioritize faith, family and God, and inspire them to make a positive impact in the world by promoting the importance of morality in today's society." One could make the argument this is well within the same category regarding mission statements. And this one is endorsed by former Daily Wire pundit Candace Owens.

The activist athleisure brand category is firmly established.

XX-XY missed an opportunity to actually put their money where their mouth is. Like by sponsoring a women's sports team or donating some proceeds to a worthy cause. Is this exactly like the "Lip-stick service to a cause" that I wrote about in 2012 where brands would vampire onto women's sports for clout, but do bupkis FOR women.

Obviously, they can, launch their brand on whatever they like, but, if I wear something to make a statement, it will be loud and clear. I will be the sucker who buys fun logo-warping off the let women speak website headed up by Kellie Jay Keen, whom I interviewed here in 2020.

The launch of this brand has gone well so far, hitting the wires fast via paid press release placements.

But how is the target market reacting?

Very hard to tell, actually, as it's not really clear who is the target market here.

On first glance it seems like right-wing types, based on the choice of celebrity spokespeople, who appeal to conservatives in their fight against gender-insanity. And it also seems to be for anyone who believes in the First Amendment because the site also talks about supporting free speech in addition to women's issues.

What I do know is that there is a huge untapped market of women who are fighting for women's rights across the political spectrum and across age groups, and that should have been the obvious target with this subject. But these women are the most savvy consumers on the planet; they will not buy something that they don't see actually supporting women beyond lip service.

This seems like an incredibly easy-to-remedy solution for the brand. But the longer they wait, the more questions women will have. And that's not the place you want to be in, especially for a new brand launch.