Westinghouse plays on ‘incompetent dad’ and ‘busy mum’ stereotypes in refreshed campaign
Household appliances company Westinghouse is showcasing the “chaos” of everyday family life in its refreshed Really Clever brand campaign, focusing on a dad with poor cooking skills, and a mother who juggles kitchen duties while managing her children’s various predicaments.
The brand said the campaign challenges category conventions and takes an honest approach to the chaos of modern family households.
A 30-second spot promoting Westinghouse’s Really Clever Steam Assist Oven shows a dad who struggles to live up to his wife’s cooking standards while she is away.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VkuhQnHZs4
The kids love it when mum is away, as it’s “fun”, but even the pet dog won’t eat his roast chicken.
“But, with the Westinghouse Steam Assist Oven, I can now cook anything,” the TV dad says.
The oven, the dad says, makes him look really clever.
The second 30-second spot showcases a mum – who by contrast has three separate meal elements being prepared on the stove top – cooking and running interference with her children.
The ad promotes the pause function on Westinghouse’s Really Clever Induction Cooktop, which enables her to leave the kitchen and attend to her children – and her husband who is scared of spiders.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgPn0n00_Gk
“Westinghouse is a brand that prides itself on an ethos of practical inventiveness by creating products that provide a true functional benefit to its customers,” Electrolux Home Products marketing director Anastasia Barlas said. “This is an iconic brand that Aussies love and so we wanted to tell our story by being honest in how we portrayed Aussie family life and the role our products play in them.”
The ad will run across broadcast, digital, social and retail for the next six months.
A Really Clever campaign execution
Credits:
Electrolux – Westinghouse
Marketing Director: Anastasia Barlas
Senior Marketing Manager ANZ: Richelle Barker
Senior Brand Manager: Karen Nguyen
Strategy & Creative: Connecting Plots
Production: Infinity Squared
Media: PHD
PR & Social: Hausmann
Digital: Orchard
How frickin original Westinghouse – a dumb dad and busy mum.
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Is this author taking a very subtle dig? I sure do hope so.
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Is this going to have issues with Ad Standards given the gender stereotypes?
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Oh … dear …
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My wife has never smiled like that standing at the stove top on the rare occasions she cooks. And she’d most likely use the pause feature to stop and have a drink. Hey Westinghouse maybe you could have done the ads with the Dad demonstrating the pause feature whilst refereeing kid disputes and the older kids being able to cook a half decent meal for their parents because of the steam assist oven.
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For someone who cares greatly about gender and diversity there is a struggle sometimes when advertising reflects the statistical bias we have in society, and some ‘clever’ strategist guided you this creative strategy. Sadly the communications we do so often just reinforces stereotypes that are unhelpful and self perpetuates the continuation. Just because the data says that women are purchasing these goods doesn’t mean you have to polarise everyone else. It is sad that people mistake female gender rights for bagging and disparaging men. Please @Westinghouse – this portrayal of a pathetic man afraid of spiders and incompetent cook is really too far. This is where the agency and producers have to be more accountable to strategy. A lot of your target audience is gonna hate it, sorry. This could have performed so much harder for you and in a gender neutral way.
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This has to be some of the dumbest advertising this year. Everyone involved should be embarrassed.
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…wow…epic fail.
Who thought these stereotypes were a good idea and who wrote these scripts…so relatable…NOT. A fine should be issued for the crime against our intelligence and the lack of genuine humour.
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Wow..
Not sure about these stereotypes or what they are trying to achieve as this is certainly not funny in the slightest…
Moving on from a high profile comedian who know’s how to deliver this stuff was probably not a good idea.
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1985 called, and wants its idea, script and casting back
this is utterly godawful
unfunny, inaccurate, condescending and gender-biased
(or is there an inference that Dad can’t cook because he spends 60 hours a week in an office making the mortgage payments, paying the utilities and grocery bills, the school fees, annual holidays etc – if this were the case the hapless stereotyping might be slightly less offensive)
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