Dove Campaign for Real Beauty to Help Foster Self-Esteem in Girls

GREENWICH, Conn., Jan. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Too many girls develop low self-esteem from insecurities about their looks and consequently fail to reach their full potential in later life. To change this, Dove, the global beauty brand, is devoting the next phase of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty to helping raise self-esteem in girls. The effort will include outreach programs, events throughout the country and multiple methods for getting involved. It is launching with a specially-produced advertising spot premiering during the television broadcast of Super Bowl XL on Sunday, Feb. 5. The brand has set the ambitious goal of reaching and truly making a difference to the lives of 1 million young people with positive self-esteem programs by 2008.

Dove launched the global Campaign for Real Beauty in 2004 to challenge beauty stereotypes and spark discussion about beauty. The Campaign aims to widen the definition of beauty and inspire positive self-image among women -- in short, to help more women feel beautiful every day. The new self-esteem initiative is extending the campaign to the next generation of women, working to help educate young girls, pre-teens and teenagers about the issues surrounding beauty, body image and self-esteem.

"A girl's sense of self is fragile and impressionable. She needs positive role models and encouraging messages to strengthen her self-respect and sense of self worth," notes Dr. Nancy Etcoff, Ph.D, a professor at Harvard University and director of the Program in Aesthetics and Well Being at the Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Psychiatry. "Our society presents girls with relentless images of 'ideal' female faces and bodies and little else. This does nothing to foster self-esteem. We need to show girls the diversity of true beauty and help them to discover their own unique beauty and take pride and pleasure in it."

The heart-tugging 45-second spot, created by Ogilvy & Mather and airing during Super Bowl XL, draws attention to the issue of self-esteem. It suggests ways adults can make a difference in how girls feel about themselves. Self-esteem issues will be brought to the forefront as the public will hear little girls speak big truths about their feelings. All throughout the spot, the voices of the members of the Girl Scouts of Nassau County Chorus from Long Island, New York can be heard singing a version of "True Colors."

Dove selected the Super Bowl, a non-traditional marketing venue for a beauty brand, for its powerful potential to bring widespread attention to the issue of self-esteem and to make a difference in the way girls feel about themselves. On Super Bowl Sunday, 89 million lives will be touched when the Dove Self-Esteem Spot premieres to both men and women.

The spot premiere kicks off the next phase of Campaign for Real Beauty -- focusing on "walking the talk" -- through the Dove Self-Esteem Fund, which was developed to help raise self-esteem in girls and young women. In the United States, the Fund supports uniquely ME!, a partnership program with Girl Scouts of the USA that fosters self-esteem among girls ages 8 to 17 through educational resources and hands-on activities. Highlights of self-esteem- building activities beginning in February include:

* Live chats will be held on http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/ with notable self-esteem experts * Wal-Mart will celebrate "Self-esteem Week," in 1,500 of its stores (Feb. 7, 8 and 9) * Self-esteem programming developed by uniquely ME! will be brought to life in more than 300 college campus communities by the national Kappa Delta sorority

"I work with young girls every day, and believing in themselves can often be as much of a challenge for them as learning to walk the balance beam," said Dawes, who won an Olympic gold medal in 1996. "There's a real need for all girls to hear and understand that they carry the power inside to grow up to be strong, beautiful women. I'm proud to join with the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty to help girls feel like champions in every part of their lives."

A Growing Problem

For girls, low self-esteem and a negative body image can start at a young age.

  * One-third of all girls in grades nine to 12 think they are overweight,
    and 60 percent are trying to lose weight.(1)
  * Only 56 percent of seventh graders say they like the way they look.(2)
  * Studies show that 57 percent of girls have fasted, gone on diets, used
    food substitutes, or smoked more cigarettes to lose weight.(3)
  * Research also shows that messages girls receive from the media can
    damage their feelings of self-worth and negatively affect their
    behavior.  More than one in four girls surveyed feel the media pressure
    them to have a perfect body.(4)
  * Girls who watch TV commercials featuring underweight models lose
    self-confidence and become more dissatisfied with their own bodies.(5)
  * As a result, girls question their own beauty: between 50 and 70 percent
    of girls of normal weight believe they are overweight.(6)

"The existing narrow definition of beauty is not only unrealistic and unattainable, but clearly it also creates hang-ups that can lead girls to question their own beauty," said Philippe Harousseau, U.S. marketing director for Dove. "It's time to free the next generation from these stereotypes and give girls the tools they need to discover their own definition of beauty."

The Campaign for Real Beauty lives online at http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/. The site houses a variety of tools for improving self-esteem in girls. Visitors can make a donation to uniquely ME! (all donations will directly benefit its self-esteem programs) as well as access and share helpful how-to information. The contents include tips for encouraging self-esteem and a "self-check" quiz, articles by leading self- esteem experts, self-esteem discussion boards and a free downloadable self- esteem building mother-daughter workbook "True You."

The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty was developed after the brand commissioned a global study that found only two percent of women around the world describe themselves as beautiful. Based on the findings, Dove created a series of advertising campaigns, outreach programs and a Web site. This program was developed to challenge beauty stereotypes and invite women worldwide to join in a discussion about beauty. Responses to the first three phases were overwhelmingly positive; the campaign has served as a catalyst to help change society's definition of beauty. More than one million women around the world have visited campaignforrealbeauty.com and shared words of encouragement supporting the efforts to widen the narrow definition of beauty. The campaign is being featured in college and post graduate textbooks, documentaries, as well as panels, conferences and other speaking engagements.

About Campaign for Real Beauty

The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty is a global effort is intended to serve as a starting point for societal change and act as a catalyst for widening the definition and discussion of beauty. Employing various communication vehicles -- advertising, http://www.campaignforealbeauty.com/, interactive billboards, panel discussions, and a Self-Esteem Fund -- the campaign invites women to join in the discussion about beauty and share their views of it with women around the world. The Campaign for Real Beauty supports the Dove mission: to make women feel more beautiful every day by challenging today's stereotypical view of beauty and inspiring women to take great care of themselves.

About the Dove Self-Esteem Fund

The Dove Self-Esteem Fund (DSEF) was established to raise the self-esteem of girls and young women to make them feel more beautiful and confident every day. The DSEF is part of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, a global effort designed to widen today's stereotypical view of beauty. A global project, the Fund consists of a network of local country initiatives linked in strategy and direction by a global steering group. In each country, the DSEF supports a specific charitable organization to help foster self-esteem.

In the U.S., the Fund supports uniquely ME!, a partnership with Girl Scouts of the USA that helps build self-confidence in girls ages 8 to 17 with educational resources and hands-on activities. In the United Kingdom and other countries, the fund supports Body Talk, an educational program about body image and self-esteem in schools.

About uniquely ME!

The uniquely ME! program was developed by Unilever (Dove's parent company) and the Girl Scouts of the USA in 2002 to foster positive self-esteem among adolescent and pre-adolescent girls ages eight-to-17 in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, with a focus on girls in underprivileged communities. The Dove Self-Esteem Fund, which supports initiatives that help educate and inspire girls to embrace a wider definition of beauty, works through the Unilever Foundation to sponsors uniquely ME!

About Dove

The Dove mission is to make women feel more beautiful every day by challenging today's stereotypical view of beauty and inspiring women to take great care of themselves. Dove, manufactured by Unilever, is the No. 1 personal wash brand nationwide. One in every three households uses a Dove product(7), which includes beauty bars, body washes, face care, anti- perspirant/deodorants, hair care and styling aids. Dove is available nationwide in food, drug and mass outlet stores.

  (1) Girl Scout Research Institute, 2002-2004.
  (2) Ibid.
  (3) Weighing In.  Girl Scouts of the USA, 2004.
  (4) "How to Love the Way You Look." Teen People. October 1999 as cited by
      Mediascope.org: Body Image and Advertising. Accessed online June 2005.
  (5) Flinders University, South Australia, 2002.
  (6) Ibid.
  (7) AC Nielsen (2004)

  Contact:

  Elizabeth Page/Edelman
  212-704-8161
  elizabeth.page@edelman.com

  Stacie Bright/Unilever
  203-625-1130
  Stacie.Bright@Unilever.com