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Hello and welcome to the Smart Beauty podcast. I'm your host, Vyla Levy, beauty journalist

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and founder of Copilot branding agency Smart Beauty Creative. We're here to create your

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brand voice and craft the story behind it. Today I'm going to talk about why we are a

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feminist branding agency. Now that word, it can provoke a lot of reactions in people and

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to be honest, it used to in me. I've always considered myself a feminist. People are kind

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of scared of that term because there's a lot of baggage, sadly, that is attached to it.

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Firstly, the idea of white feminism, the fact that women from minority groups are kind of

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shut out of the discussion. There seems to be a kind of monoculture in the current feminist

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movement, which is a shame. But that's a whole other conversation for another podcast. And

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also for me, there was some aspects of feminism that I didn't agree with or some feminists

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that I didn't particularly like. And I think you worry that people are going to associate

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you with certain ideas or certain people once you align yourself to a particular movement.

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But it's something that also I didn't think I needed to really shout about when talking

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about my agency, because I assumed that that would already be kind of baked in to what

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we were offering. But I was chatting with somebody the other day who is a branding expert, and

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I was telling her about the ethos and the mission behind smart beauty and why the beauty

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world is going through much needed change. And the way we talk to customers has changed

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drastically from generations before where the language was very patronising, women were

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being spoken to like idiots basically. And I say women because they were the ones who

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were being marketed to. We were the ones that were mainly buying products or considered

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to be the ones who were mainly buying beauty products, flowery adjectives, not really telling

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us how the products worked or what was in them, not really explaining the science behind

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the products. Thankfully, that's all changed with the rise of digital marketing and social

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media and DTC brands. Consumers are far more informed and savvy and cynical than they were

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in the past. And they're putting brands through their paces, people are having to come up

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with the goods and show the receipts and say this is the science, this is why this product

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works and why you should spend your hard earned money on it. So my kind of vision with smart

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beauty was to help brands navigate that and create an authentic message that helps provoke

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intelligent discussion, shows the brands credentials and shows that they have strong scientific

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evidence to back up their claims. So basically talking to consumers in a way that doesn't

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patronize them, doesn't belittle them, doesn't play on their insecurities or create problems

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just so they can sell products on how to quote unquote solve them. So yeah, very problematic

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industry and it still is today, but it is changing. And with smart beauty creative, I

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want to be at the forefront of that. So this person I was speaking to said, well, it sounds

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like your approach is very feminist and you should make that front and center. And I think

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that there is something to be said for that, because sadly, the beauty world has been very

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male dominated. If you look at, I don't know if you ever watched Mad Men, but that that

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kind of era, it was marketing men coming up with concepts, deciding how these products

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were going to be sold and marketed. They were the ones kind of at the helm of a lot of beauty

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brands. But now things have changed. Now there's more female founders. We're still waiting for

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women founders to get investment, especially women of color. So that is another aspect

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of what we do here at Smart Beauty Creative. We want to empower these female founders and

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create core verbal strategy that's not going to just focus on getting the customers on

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board, but also focus on investors and media and other key stakeholders that are going

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to be pivotal in whether this brand is a success or not. So that's kind of the core mission.

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And I think that there's nothing wrong with saying that we're feminists in that spirit,

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that we are putting a fresh feminist perspective on the way we talk about beauty, the way we

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market beauty. I think a lot of the time, beauty and feminism are seen as mutually exclusive.

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So the industry was previously seen as very fickle. If you kind of wore makeup, you were

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a victim of the patriarchy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, all that kind of common criticism.

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And while the beauty industry definitely has elements within it that are very problematic

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and probably ring true in that respect, I don't think that the beauty industry as a whole

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should be written off in that way. I think that there is so much scope in this industry

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for female empowerment, for women to feel good about themselves, to create products

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where they feel good, but it's not based, it doesn't necessarily hinge around looking

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good or looking good just to feel good, if that makes sense.

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I think the beauty world is a great place where you can find lots of welcoming communities,

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much more so than the fashion world, I would say. Beauty is far less elitist, it's more

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democratic, more people can afford to buy nice beauty products than they can afford

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a couture dress. And that's what I love about it. And that's what I want to shout about

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and just the amazing people within it, especially the women within it. And I think feminism

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can be a huge part of that. I think it also, it paves a new way for beauty marketing because

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I think a lot of the criticism that gets leveled at the beauty industry, a lot of that is to

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do with how products are marketed. And I'm very much against playing on people's insecurities

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in order to sell products. I think all these new indie brands or corporate brands with

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an indie spirit are waking up to that fact and realising that it's not about approaching

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it in a negative way and playing on people's hangups and making people feel bad about themselves

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and fear mongering. It's about helping people use beauty products as tools of empowerment,

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tools of self care, but not relying on them just so they can feel good about themselves

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because that's where I feel the distinction lies. And that's where beauty marketing and

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language can become very toxic. So that's what I want to change and also provide, as

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I say, a female take on how beauty products should be marketed and how we talk about beauty.

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I think that we still desperately need that. I think we're moving in the right direction,

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but a lot of brands still don't get it. And especially I have to say in the fragrance

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world, a lot of brands are still falling back on these old tropes where they feel the need

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to market a bottle of fragrance with a celebrity or with a half naked model gazing seductively

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at the camera. There are some amazing perfume campaigns, iconic ones, but I feel like that

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way of selling perfume has become very antiquated and doesn't really chime with modern consumers

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and the reasons that we buy perfume and the way that we relate to it. Just selling perfume

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as a way to say, oh, you know, you'll smell like the celebrity or it'll make you smell

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more seductive so you can allure and admire. I mean, there is that there is that element,

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but there are so many other ways that you can enjoy perfume and there are so many angles

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that you can approach it from. And I just feel that beauty brands should just be a bit more

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experimental and just have more fun and actually hire people who represent the customers that

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they're trying to reach. So that is why I would say that we are a proudly feminist branding

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agency. I think a lot of our wording and language is inspired by feminist authors. And it was

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something that I was always interested in when I was a teenager growing up, I would

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read a lot of feminist texts from Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own, to novels or short

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novels like The Yellow Wallpaper or feminist texts like Jane Eyre, for example. And there

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was something about that that I always wanted to kind of carry with me whatever career path

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I decided to go down. So there's something quite nice about that that I feel like with

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Smart Beauty I'm helping to contribute in whatever way I can to the feminist discussion

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and move the needle a bit more. I read a book called The Beauty Myth by Naomi Woolf and

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that really stuck with me. To be honest with you, it was a very long time ago that I read

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it, but it was obviously very scathing of beauty and how products are sold to women.

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And while I completely take those concerns on board, I think that we are a bit more open-minded

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when it comes to getting beautified and wanting to look good. It doesn't necessarily mean

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that we're victims of the patriarchy. So in that spirit, that's what I think we're about

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here at Smart Beauty Creative. If it sounds like something that you could get on board

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with that you think your brand could benefit from, please get in touch and you can arrange

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a discovery call on our website and we can chat a bit further about how we can work

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together.

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I hope you enjoyed that episode. All links will be in the show notes and feel free to

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visit SmartBeautyCreative.com or visit us over on Instagram to find out more about what

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we do. And if you enjoyed listening, please don't forget to write and review Smart Beauty

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on iTunes as it helps people find us. See you next time.