Even the most conservative of companies rely on sex to sell their products. It plays into one of our deepest human desires.
"Sexual information does grab attention," says University of Georgia's Tom Reichert.
"As long as people desire to be attractive to others, and as long as people desire romance, intimacy, and love, and all the wonderful feelings they involve," he says, "advertisers can show how their products help meet those needs and desires. Whether we like it or not, products play a role in society’s intimacy equation."
But since it saturates the market, this means of selling a product doesn't always work. Just look at American Apparel and Abercrombie & Fitch, which have long relied on sex as a key selling point — now they're struggling to differentiate their brands.
American Apparel has been pushing boundaries since the late 1990s
American Apparel is constantly pushing the boundaries with its sex-infused ads.
When the clothing company ran a billboard on Houston Street showing a woman wearing leggings and nothing else while bending over, people got angry.
The brand has been running racy campaigns since at least 1995, with a 2000 underwear ad taking the cake. The advertisement shows a woman wearing the clothing line's underwear, and nothing else.
But American Apparel has been struggling for years and is trying to turn around its operations.
Abercrombie & Fitch catalogs caused such a public outcry the company pulled them from the shelves
Clothing maker Abercrombie & Fitch has always pushed the envelope when it comes to advertisements.
But the A&F Quarterly takes the cake. The quarterly, which made its initial run in the late 1990s, is infused with nudity and sexuality. In 2003, thousands of Americans threatened to boycott the store, causing it to stop selling the cataloge for a time.
The quarterly came back on the scene in 2008, but was only launched in European markets. Tom Lennox, the brand's vice president of corporate communications, said he thought the quarterly would appeal to the "British open-minded approach to culture and creativity."
Like American Apparel, the brand has been performing below expectations, as it's facing increased competition from other clothing brands targeting young consumers.
PETA is known for its provocative ads, but it went a step further by rolling out a softcore porn site
PETA's ads are so offensive, major news networks even turn their backs against the organization.
For example, in 2009, PETA wanted to run a pro-vegetarian ad campaign during the Superbowl that showed models licking eggplants and pumpkins, among other things. NBC wouldn't hop on board though, saying the ad "depicts a level of sexuality exceeding our standards."
The animal-rights group pushed the envelope even further in August 2011, announcing it would roll out a softcore porn website, with spokeswoman Ashley Byrne telling the Herald Sun, “Our racier actions are sometimes a way to get people to sit up and pay attention to the plight of animals."
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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