Be a woman, take it like a man.

[venta]

A while back I noticed posters advertising a "protein shake" called, I think, Upbeat and made a note to try it. I figured it was a potentially interesting snack-concept for days when I want to go straight from work to, say, a yoga class without keeling over. (Lots of other interesting snack-concepts are also available but hey, I quite like milkshake).

This morning, outside Ealing Broadway station, there were gentlemen in leather jackets handing out free samples of a chocolate "40% higher protein" milkshake called Wing-Co. Obviously protein shakes are the new Thing. Wing-Co has a blocky cartoon of a WWII-era pilot (his moustache dripping chocolate milk) on the bottle, and small planes whizzing past the nutritional information.

It's pretty nice, actually. Chocolate milkshake is very variable and often has a nasty, grainy texture but I enjoyed this one. Whether it can actually make good on its promise to "shoot down hunger, fast" remains to be seen. But I could imagine buying it again.

Except...

As the free-samplers were dishing out the bottles this morning, they said "Man up with Wing-Co!" to everyone they handed one to. According to the info box on the label, "WING-CO IS PROPER MAN FUEL". "DON'T BE A GIRL," it further elaborates, "SHAKE IT UP AND DRINK IT NOW!"

Oh. Good.

The info box is, of course, designed to look like a plate which has been screwed onto the bottle. Because, y'know, screws are very manly (they look like slotted-head countersunk woodscrews to me).

Think I'll try out Upbeat after all. In fact, Wing-Co has inspired me to compare the two, and Upbeat has real fruit in it, and more protein, and is made entirely from British milk.

Comments

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

I think you're right that companies which take a stand against sexism probably benefit from a boost in their public profile, even if they were the very ones perpetuating the sexism which they are now standing against in the first place. I think the only strategy we can take as consumers if we want to combat sexism is to buy from companies which reflect our values and not from those which don't (and to say so loudly in both cases on the internet).

Over time, and especially at present when there really do seem to be more and more voices uniting against sexism, I would hope that the economic penalties associated with sexist marketing would become strong enough to mean that companies did not want to incur them just for the sake of the benefits which they could then reap by turning into one of the 'good guys' - i.e. it would be more beneficial just to be one of the good guys in the first place.

But that's an optimistic view, which will only works if there is genuinely an overall economic penalty associated with this kind of marketing. At the moment, the makers of Wing-Co clearly think exactly the opposite.

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

At the moment, the makers of Wing-Co clearly think exactly the opposite.

Either that or they just don't think in a way that makes this kind of marketing seem problematic.

We live in our comfortable little filter bubbles online, forgetting what the world is like. If "everyone" agrees on something here, that might only be 10% or even 1% of people out in the real world.