Dive Brief:
- Clothing retailer Gap Inc. and agency Untitled Worldwide ditched professional models to showcase "real" people in the brand's recently launched summer campaign, according to a news release made available to Marketing Dive.
- A creative team scoured grocery stores, malls and colleges across the country to find a diverse set of 20 people to pose for the "I Am Gap" promotions that will play across digital, social and in-store.
- "Gap's history is defined by [the] championing of American optimism and individual style," MT Carney, founder of Untitled Worldwide, told Marketing Dive. "To capture this essence, we went on a road trip across America and street cast individuals that we met along the way — from the conservative cowboy to the Native American activist to the Sudanese refugee — all with different stories."
Dive Insight:
Gap is not the first company to experience celebrity fatigue in advertising. Barney's, Betabrand and Aerie are just a few retailers that have turned to amateurs or unretouched ads to promote authenticity and better connect with customers, and especially younger customers.
Gap is tapping into that trend by featuring its own set of everyday fans in a brand mission to illustrate what the classic American summer means to different people — and, of course, how its clothes fit into that.
Shot in six cities around the country, in both urban and rural environments, the campaign aims to showcase diversity and simplicity, two signature elements the brand strives for, according to Carney.
Not only do amateurs typically come with a lower price tag than professional models or top-tier influencers do, they're often trusted more. Nearly one-third (30%) of consumers are more likely to purchase a product endorsed by a non-celebrity, according to a report by marketing firm Collective Bias. Among that group, 70% of millennials strongly preferred such "peer" endorsements.
