Dive Brief:

• P&G's tampon brand Tampax has partnered with comedian Amy Schumer to help educate women about menstruation, according to a press release.
• Schumer stars in a series of humorous videos intended to teach viewers about periods and how to use tampons. Dr. Melisa Holmes, OB/GYN and co-founder of community health education group Girlology, is also featured in the campaign answering questions about personal health. The spots were directed by Kathy Fusco of Hungryman.
• The multichannel campaign is running on TV, video, digital and social media. The effort includes a custom Snapchat Lens that allows users to put themselves in a Tampax tampon costume.

Dive Insight:

P&G's Tampax brand is restarting its marketing efforts after a pause "to shift focus to support more urgent needs," said Melissa Suk, VP of North America Tampax and Always, in a statement. Overall, Procter & Gamble boosted its marketing spending in the first quarter as U.S. sales soared during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic.

Other major marketers like Coca-Cola have recently started marketing again following pausing their efforts during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic when consumers weren't interested in much beyond the health crisis. These big brands jumping back into marketing suggests they see a somewhat more stable situation with consumers more open to hearing brand messaging, if not a return to normal.

For Tampax, the return to marketing is based on research showing that there is still need for education around menstruation more than 60 years after the brand created its education department. Tampax tapped popular comedian Schumer to create a campaign that teaches people how to understand their bodies so that they can feel educated and empowered about using tampons. The effort uses medically accurate information along with humor to make the conversations more comfortable.

The brand cited research conducted by Harris Poll for Tampax that said that 41% of women are not completely confident that they know how to correctly insert a tampon. The 2020 Tampax Period Education Survey found that 94% of adults do not know how many days the average menstrual cycle lasts and 77% of adults believe that a tampon can get lost inside a woman's body. Additionally, 62% of women can't locate a vagina on a diagram and 13% admit they do not know anything about tampons. One of the challenges facing broader access to this healthcare knowledge is that only 29 states require sex and reproductive health education, and of those, only 22 states require a medically accurate syllabus, per P&G.

The Tampax campaign follows similar efforts to normalize and destigmatize conversations about women's bodies and health issues in advertising by brands like Billie, Poise and Ruby Love.