Cosmetics maker Chifure has launched a new TV, web and print campaign, “Save Woman”, featuring a range of woman all from different Japanese regions, each with their own message on being beautiful.
As the slightly Jinglish title of the campaign suggests, Chifure is apparently supporting the average Japanese female to go about her daily life in the most beautiful way possible. Faced with all the economic woes, consumers are worried about spending too much on little luxuries like cosmetics. Enter Chifure, who provides great cosmetics at fair prices.
“Bijin” (美人), or “beautiful girl”, is an ideal in Japanese culture cropping up in everything from ukiyoe to blog parts, and is certainly a ubiquitous element of Japanese advertising. Chifure’s campaign compares interestingly with Shiseido and its Tsubaki product, which almost always uses a stalwart of famous models and actresses parading in unison under the slogan “Japanese women are beautiful” (日本の女性は美しい).
Here the concept is the same; the faces different. Chifure has opted for “ordinary” representatives of bijin from the forty-seven prefectures of Japan: instead of Yukie Nakama you get Keiko Imano, a thirty-eight year old confectionist from Miyagi prefecture, or Tomoe, a twenty-five year old cheerleader from Ibaraki.
However, Chifure is still using a famous model, Ryo — and skimpily dressed at that — for one of the TV ads. A curated choice of fifteen of the “ordinary” bijin are relegated to a separate commercial, as well as appearing in ads in their local regional newspapers. Apparently further waves of the campaign will introduce other bijin from the regions, eventually covering all of Japan’s forty-seven prefectures.
It compares revealingly with Shiseido’s new Beauty Airport campaign. Here there is also a collaboration with several print media but with a different style entirely: in this case, six famous models, each representing separate fashion magazines, are doing a “beauty tour” with Shiseido’s products.
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