Chanel Man vs. Chanel Woman

After having analyzed a lot of advertisements (especially clothing ads, sports ads, and jewelry ads) whether targeting men or women for our first papers we wrote in class, I never really thought about how cosmetic companies use specific bottle designs and copy as well as the packaging to target men or women. As Kirkham and Weller state, “the appearance and presentation of the product is as important as the product itself” (268). Many cosmetics advertisements are organized externally based on how it is read and gender relations. Kirkham and Weller argue how Clinique targets either women or men via the appearance of their products, not just that, but it is important to also target women in men products because many women will buy for their husbands, boyfriends, or fathers. In cosmetic advertisements, just like in many other forms of advertising, stereotypes are strongly reinforced to target their specific audience. It is interesting to note that many of the women’s cosmetic packaging (especially if it is a high class brand) do not need to say “for women” on the bottle. However, cosmetic packaging for men almost always reinforce that this product is “FOR MEN,” to prove that using male “cosmetics is not necessarily the first step on the road to abandoning one’s masculinity” (269). The text on the bottle is as important as the packaging itself, it is very easy to decipher female products in the sense that they are often (yellow, pink, or pastels and men’s are more black, white, blue, etc), but what is written on the bottle holds much importance as well.




Take a look at these two perfumes bottles for Chanel (it is important to note that not just Clinique uses this approach to advertisements), the bottle for the men, says ALLURE HOMME (which means MAN in French), right underneath that it says Sport. Many cosmetic bottles for men will have either writing that suggests fitness (health), strength, simplicity, as well as male words like rough and tough. Contrast this bottle with the woman’s Chanel perfume bottle. This bottle has warm sensual colors, the yellow, red and the gold rim around the packaging and gold around the bottle cap adding class. The perfume does NOT say FEMME in huge writing, which would mean woman in French, instead the audience automatically realizes that this perfume is made for women just by its appearance. Right underneath Allure is says, sensual, much of the copy on women’s packaging suggests extra care, softness, beauty, sexiness. Another aspect I found really interesting about these two bottles is that for the male bottle it says, “Eau de Toilette” and for women it says, “Eau de Parfum,” after looking this up online I found that “Eau de Toilette” contains only 7 to 12 % perfume concentrates and “Eau de Parfum” contains 12 to 18% perfume concentrates meaning for women the sense is much stronger and for men the sense is much more subdued.



Lastly for another interesting look at another company (that is not as high end) and their copy on their bottles take a look at Garnier's deodorant bottles. Looking closely on the male bottle there is MEN in huge writing, extreme cool, and dark colors on the bottle. Contrast this with the deodorant for the women there is pastel colors (lavendar, white, pale green) and the copy states EXTRA CARE and FLORAL FRESH at the bottom.