Post 12

What is the product, sex or underwear? In this day and age sex sells and Calvin Klein is notorious for using sex appeal to sell their products and this advertisement is no exception to that fact. The image used in this particular advertisement is that of an attractive woman who is slim and in good shape laying on a couch wearing only a bra, panties, and a pair of jeans that she is in the process of taking off. Who is this advertisement going to appeal to, men or women? Men. This is a result of the sex appeal being utilized by Calvin Klein in their advertisement. Had the advertisement not said “underwear” underneath Calvin Klein, it would have been challenging to determine what the product was. In retrospect, Calvin Klein also has advertisements of attractive men in their underwear or a pair of jeans without a shirt on. These advertisements are used to appeal to women instead.
Since one of the keys to successful advertising is to catch people’s “eyeballs.” Obviously an effective strategy to doing this is through provocative and suggestive imagery- specifically suggestive displays of scantily clad models. In fact Calvin Klein’s initial advertising campaigns utilizing scantily clad youth provoked allegations of child pornography. As a result, Calvin Klein was forced to reconsider their advertising strategies. This demonstrates that simply being risqué is not enough. Advertisers such as Calvin Klein, Victoria’s Secret, and Abercrombie and Fitch are no longer content with the implication of sexuality but are pushing the envelope in an effort to stand out and are creating more and more raw and explicit images. This trend has continued to evolve and given the fact that the models still have some of their clothes on allows advertising sex appeal to escalate to a new level.