Media Factsheet - Score hair cream

 Media Factsheet - Score hair cream

Go to our Media Factsheet archive on the Media Shared drive and open Factsheet #188: Close Study Product - Advertising - Score. Our Media Factsheet archive is on the Media Shared drive: M:\Resources\A Level\Media Factsheets. If you need to access this from home you can download it here if you use your Greenford login details to access Google Drive.

Read the factsheet and answer the following questions:

1) How did advertising techniques change in the 1960s and how does the Score advert reflect this change?

advertising agencies used to rely less on market research and focused more on "creative instinct".  Copy was still used to offer an explanation of the product but the visuals took on a greater importance. The “new advertising” of the 1960s took its cue from the visual medium of TV and the popular posters of the day. Print ads took on a realistic look, relying more on photography than illustration, and TV spots gained sophistication as new editing techniques were mastered.

2) What representations of women were found in post-war British advertising campaigns?

The post-war period was characterised by campaigns that reinforced that idea that a woman’s place at home. However, during the Second World War, propaganda posters had convinced women that their place was on farms and in factories while the men were away fighting.

3) Conduct your own semiotic analysis of the Score hair cream advert: What are the connotations of the mise-en-scene in the image? You may wish to link this to relevant contexts too.

Costume and background creates connotations of Britain's colonial past and Empire. One model directly addresses the audience directly through the use of eye contact. Male dominance and power is shown though the use of the gun which can be seen as a phallic symbol. Women's placement and expression reinforce male dominance.

4) What does the factsheet suggest in terms of a narrative analysis of the Score hair cream advert?

The Score advert identifies the man as Propp’s ‘hero’ in this narrative. The adoration and availability of the females seen in the advert are his reward for such masculine endeavours. This has a clear appeal to younger males who would identify with the male and aspire to be like the male in the advert and gain the same "perks" as him.

5) How might an audience have responded to the advert in 1967? What about in the 2020s?

In 1967, a male audience may have felt at ease and relieved as they would be able to use this hair cream without being questioned about their sexuality. This was necessary for the advert as 1967 was the decriminalisation of homosexuality and as a result, men were anxious and uneasy. However, a modern audience would most likely be annoyed, even disgusted, about how women were portrayed in this advert as well as the discrimination against homosexuals which is evident by how much they emphasise the masculinity   of the hair cream.

6) How does the Score hair cream advert use persuasive techniques (e.g. anchorage text, slogan, product information) to sell the product to an audience?

They paid much more attention to building a character for the brand. The brand message is to  present the product as grooming product for a 'real' man which was greatly received at the time as it eased the usage of this grooming product

7) How might you apply feminist theory to the Score hair cream advert - such as van Zoonen, bell hooks or Judith Butler?

Judith Butler asserts that gender is not biologically determined but rather socially determined; learned through society. She believes that gender is a performance. Both the male and the female in the Score advert are performing the roles of the man and the woman in accordance with their biological sex. 

8) How could David Gauntlett's theory regarding gender identity be applied to the Score hair cream advert

David Gauntlett argues that both media producers and audiences play a role in constructing identities. The role of the producer in shaping ideas about masculinity is clear in the Score advert, which is similar to other media texts of that time.

9) What representation of sexuality can be found in the advert and why might this link to the 1967 decriminalisation of homosexuality (historical and cultural context)?

“It’s a commonly held misconception that the 1967 act legalised male homosexuality. It didn’t. It partially decriminalised it under certain conditions. Incredibly, several police constabularies actively took advantage of loop holes in the Sexual Offences act of 1967 to prosecute homosexual men engaging in consensual sex in their own homes. Research by Peter Tatchell confirms this: in 1966 some 420 men were convicted of the gay crime of gross indecency. By 1974, that number had soared by more than 300% to over 1,700 convictions.

10) How does the advert reflect Britain's colonial past - another important historical and cultural context?

The reference to colonialist values can also be linked to social and cultural contexts of the ending of the British Empire. The score advert follows the narrative of the hunter on a successful hunt. The jungle setting, the gun, the throne all infer that the white western male has been successful in fighting off primitives or dangerous animals to save his own tribe.

Wider reading
The Drum: This Boy Can article

1) Why does the writer suggest that we may face a "growing 'boy crisis'"?

A growing global ‘boy crisis’ suggests that we could be, in fact, empowering the wrong sex. Of course, women are woefully under-represented in boardrooms and certain walks of life, with casual sexism and unconscious bias still endemic, but the difference is that we are all now familiar with the narrative around tackling these issues.

2) How has the Axe/Lynx brand changed its marketing to present a different representation of masculinity?

As Lynx/Axe found when it undertook a large-scale research project into modern male identity, men are craving a more diverse definition of what it means to be a ‘successful’ man in 2016, and to relieve the unrelenting pressure on them to conform to suffocating, old paradigms. This insight led to the step-change ‘Find Your Magic’ campaign from the former bad-boy brand.

3) How does campaigner David Brockway, quoted in the article, suggest advertisers "totally reinvent gender constructs"?

Campaigner David Brockway, who manages the Great Initiative’s Great Men project, urges the industry to be “more revolutionary”, particularly when it comes to male body image, which he says is at risk of following the negative path. He meant everything that goes with that feeling such as seeing himself as lazy, unaccomplished and incapable.” In order to prevent a full blown crisis of self-worth, Brockway advocates that advertisers “totally reinvent gender constructs” and dare to paint a world where boys like pink, don’t like going out and getting dirty, or aren’t career ambitious, for example.

4) How have changes in family and society altered how brands are targeting their products?

The definition of “family” in places like Britain is profoundly changing – but advertising is not helping to normalise different scenarios by largely failing to portray this new normal. Joey Whincup, insight director at Creative Race, agrees that success comes down to better research and she’s witnessing a slow but growing shift towards targeting consumers on more than the usual male

5) Why does Fernando Desouches, Axe/Lynx global brand development director, say you've got to "set the platform" before you explode the myth of masculinity?

Axe global brand development director, he knows that. And, as he says, you’ve got to “set the platform” before you explode the myth. “This is just the beginning. The slap in the face to say ‘this is masculinity’. All these guys in the ad are attractive. Now we have our platform and our point of view, we can break the man-bullshit and show it doesn’t matter who you want to be, just express yourself and we will support that. “What being a man means, and what ‘success’ means, is changing and this change is for the good. The message hasn’t exploded yet but we will make it explode. We will democratise it.”