Lane Bryant's Fall 2016 Marketing Campaign

Lane Bryant’s Fall 2016 avant-garde campaign featured an advertisement entitled #ThisBody Is Made to Shine.  The campaign featured plus-sized celebrities and models such as Ashley Graham, Candice Huffine, and the outgoing Gabourey Sidibe.

The campaign focused on self-confidence and was on a mission to curtail body or fat shaming in social media and in society as a whole. The ad cleverly used a YouTube Video, filmed in black and white, with Lane Bryant models reading actual comments posted to them on social media regarding their bodies, paying little attention to whether the comments were negative or positive.  The campaign included snippets of several joyous plus-size models in their underwear on black and white video responding to negative replies to this campaign.  The replies were triumphant, filled with confidence, sassiness and demanded respect.

The use of this campaign is to employ the visibility of video to respond to the anonymity of Twitter.  The darkness of those negative replies was compounded with the joy and confidence of the video replies. In contrast to Twitter, these replies were unhidden, transparent and empowering. 

This marketing campaign left a great impression on me and became part of my top of mind awareness while doing my favorite pastime of shopping. The genius of this campaign was a subtle pushback to the obvious attacks on the perceived perfect body image and the subliminal messages portrayed by the media.  There was an element of exuberance as the Lane Bryant models delicately challenged the images portrayed by Victoria’s Secret models.  There are some advertising campaigns that do not affect you, but this campaign appealed to my visceral side, remained in my memory and prompted me to visit Lane Bryant.