J. Walter Thompson London’s new ad campaign aims to drive debate and awareness around the gender pay gap by showing how offensive the world can seem with 25% missing.
On International Women’s Day, the agency launched the campaign to highlight the fact that women are paid on average 25% less than men.
“When we found out that women globally make a quarter less than men we felt f***ing frustrated. So our idea was to make everybody feel f**** frustrated,” Katia Schutz and Stefan Foster, creatives at JWT told DIVERGE. “It’s vital that there is awareness and debate around this issue but instead of just talking about it, we wanted to make the audience really feel it.”
Research from JWT’s Female Tribes’ global Women’s Index study showed that 53% of women felt they were paid less than men for the same job, and 53% felt it was harder to ask for a pay rise as a woman.
Female Tribes was launched by JWT to change the cultural narrative around women, and specifically to champion Female Capital – the value that women bring to the world as women.
“Removing 25% of anything can fundamentally change the meaning, and underpaying women confers an implicit or even explicit message to women as to how much they are valued in society,” said Rachel Pashley, creator of Female Tribes and Global Planner at JWT, in a statement.
The ads will appear on more than 800 digital poster sites across the UK with media delivered for free by Maxus Global.
When asked if a provocative campaign like this is essential in getting everyone’s attention, Schutz and Foster stated: “We wouldn’t say it’s essential to be provocative to get people’s attention, but done properly it certainly helps. And with all the other great content and debate raised on International Women’s Day we needed a way to cut through. We hope seeing the campaign will be a moment that sticks with people – whether it offends or drive empathy, it’s the emotional reaction that is key.
JWT also highlighted women role models in a global campaign for IWD.
Credits
Creative: Katia Schutz
Creative: Stefan Foster
Executive Creative Director: Lucas Peon
Creative director: Jaspar Shelbourne
Project Manager: Kate Madden
Account Director: Charlie Martyn
Planner: Dan Cameron
Planner: Rachel Pashley
Digital strategist: Pierre-Henry Briec
Media agency: Maxus
Media Agency Managing Director: Anna Hickey
Media Agency Chief Executive: Lindsay Pattison
