Nirali
Mehta
Client: Stretchery 2019 Field: Research/ Communication Strategy & design/ Art direction
Any' BODY'
At Stretchery, our endeavour, since the launch was to act as catalysts in expanding perspectives on our wellbeing and of the environment. As a part of our evolving strategy, we launched 5-week long communication campaign, with the aim to build a strong foundation that reflected our value proposition by questioning the current perceptions of mind & body.
How might we collectively re-imagine our bodies, in more loving & optimistic way?
First segment of the campaign was to focus on spreading the right and positive awareness about body acceptance. We dived into research focused on gaining relevant insights from our customers and target audience to understand how women felt and thought about their bodies. Questioning the idea of body and what it stands for was a basic criterion if we had to challenge the established norms - What do their bodies mean to them ? What did their body do for them? Does it define them ? If yes, how so? etc. To get better clarity on this from them we needed to deep dive. We conducting surveys, held one on one interaction and events. This was carried out with - online forms, emails, blogs and offline "For Any'BODY' " events. From about 230 women ( customers and target customers), it wasn't surprising to see that around 62% of women were not happy with their bodies ( shape, form, colour, flexibility to name a few factors) And more than 80% of women wanted to change something about their bodies. Most of them had some version of an ideal look and size that they had in mind and wanted to achieve, that was based on how people perceive them, or to look like someone in comparison.
With this we quickly realized the need to educate our audience about the need to redefine the 'ideal body' concept. Inspire them to re-imagine their bodies, based on what it was capable of and the extent they could work with it. At a time when not many home-grown brands addressed this issue, we decided to use our findings by integrating creating awareness and sharing views through visuals and experiences. Our concept was to create a campaign that enabled us to bring inspiring message to mainstream audiences that was accessible and acceptable. The name Any'BODY' conveyed it with clarity. Through Any ’BODY’ campaign we set out to explore how compassion and dialogue could not only change but enrich our everyday interaction with our bodies and minds.
As this was not a collection launch or product campaign, we created the concept around clear visuals, speaking of our message as directly as possible, with no frills. Our interaction with our community and others outside of it, led us to a clear direction- to want to shoot with real women from around us, highlighting the strong individuals they are ‘without measure’. We showcased styles designed for all body types, using the bold and colourful palettes to symbolize the unapologetic enjoyment of and in vibrant bodies.
Rethinking the relationship with out bodies
It has always been easier to reject rather than accept our bodies. Can we create a deeper connect with it? Appearance more often than not marks us out, so how can we bring a change of perspective? These were some of the questions we set out to explore with the second segment. Specifically, we wanted to explore how the campaign might be used as a tool to understanding the inner rhythms of daily routines with our bodies, to enable a more healthy relationship with it.
Our initiative, 'Dear Body', was conceived to let people talk to their bodies as if it was an entity of its own, and how might that affect our health and well-being and overall relationship with it. We asked our customers two questions:
If we could talk to our bodies what would we say? How would we be thankful?
The result almost instantly transformed their idea and ideals into gratification, love and most importantly acceptance.
Centred on our DNA, the campaign was designed to go beyond product marketing. To support our message, we extended our marketing collaterals with posters, journals and keepsakes keeping in mind the digital launch and what the campaign embodied.
Further to that we conducted offline events – Any’BODY’ meet ups, small groups of people coming from all walks of life to discuss their journeys with their bodies. Anybody who had something to share or needed support could be a part of it. Though this was conceived almost as a support group activity to be conducted once a month, we were not able to conduct it regularly and with the impact that we originally conceived it with. We realized we had a long way to work and improvise, but were glad to be able to initiate it.
But the final result of this campaign to us was positive and so uplifting.
