Until 1911, soap ads usually featured a picture of — what else? — soap. Ivory soap, for example, had become the most popular brand, with its slogan, “Ninety-nine and 44/100 Percent Pure.” But Woodbury shifted the focus from the product to its possibilities; in this case, the amorous attention of a gentleman. With its then-racy tagline, “A Skin You Love to Touch,” the ads are regarded as the first to use sex to sell a product. At the time, many found the ad shocking.
The advertisement was the creation of Helen Lansdowne Resor, whom some regard as the first successful female ad writer. Resor would later become a leading figure at the J. Walter Thompson agency, hiring and promoting women to creative roles in the agency at a time when women were usually consigned to clerical work.
Her Woodbury’s Soap campaign had the desired effect. In eight years, sales rose 1,000 percent. Woodbury would stick with the slogan for over 30 years.
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Comments
This really is a beautiful ad! Ms. Resor was smart to acknowledge the artist who painted it, and make it available in color with the coupon in the right-hand corner. I’d love to see that. I’d assume it would have been without the ad copy, but probably not without the bar of soap, lest we forget it’s Woodbury’s Facial Soap.