Recently, my husband came home from a trip to Lowes with an unexpected purchase. Impulse buys in Lowes aren’t unheard of in our home, but I certainly wasn’t expecting his impulse buy to be lip balm – specifically Duke Cannon Offensively Large Lip Balm. He had to show it to me since it was being marketed specifically to men (along with other personal care products like soap) and being sold in such an unexpected place.
While my partner doesn’t care about products specifically targeted to people with a given gender identity, the large size hooked him as they market it as harder to loose/overlook. (That said, he misplaced it not too long after buying it, so it may not work as well as they want you to believe). It really is much larger than typically lip balm as shown below next to a tube of more traditional scale I had lying around. I’d argue it’s actually too large to be practical in terms of fitting the scale of lips for application.
I understand companies need to find their niche for marketing, and if there isn’t room within the existing market, creating new demand can be a good strategy. That said, I don’t understand why lip balm had to be gendered (of course, I could say this about many things). Regardless, this is a good example of how traditional binary gender roles show up all around us all the time.
What gendered products or marketing campaigns have surprised you lately?