Women’s lingerie chain Victoria’s Secret is reportedly pulling back from its recent woke ad campaigns featuring obese models, transgenders, and anti-American gay soccer star Megan Rapinoe after sales plummeted.
In 2021, the sexy underwear company moved away from what it called a “hyper-sexualized” image and dove face-first into a woke remake of its brand. But apparently, the results of this rebranding was a steep loss of revenue, Fox News reported.
A combo of pictures made on July 2, 2021, shows Body Positive activists (From L and up, Valerie Hirschfield, Jeremie Antoine, Georgia Stein, Camille Adin, Caroline Ida Ours, Rose-Aimee Juste, Marina Magro, David Venkatapen, Emma Martins) posing in lingerie during a photo session in Paris on June 30, 2021. (JOEL SAGET/AFP via Getty Images)
The rebranding kicked off in July of 2021 when the company named Rapinoe and transgender model Valentina Sampaio its brand ambassadors.
At the time, hard-core, left-wing activist Rapinoe had blasted Victoria’s Secret as pushing a message that was “really harmful” and one that was “patriarchal, sexist, viewing not just what it meant to be sexy but what the clothes were trying to accomplish through a male lens and through what men desired.”
The campaign also included overweight models and plus-sized mannequins, upon which the clothing was displayed in ads and stores.
Along with the public face rebranding, the company also moved to fill most of its board positions with female applicants.
This rebranding campaign came two years after the company’s famed annual fashion show was done away with. The last such show occurred in 2018.
But despite all those moves to woke the company and please left-wing critics, Business of Fashion reporter Cathaleen Chen was shocked to report this week that all the “favorable reviews from online critics never translated into sales.”
Rose-Aimee Juste, 63, retiree, occasional model, and Body Positive activist, poses in lingerie during a photo session in Paris on June 28, 2021. (JOEL SAGET/AFP via Getty Images)
Consequently, Victoria’s Secret projected revenue for 2023 at $6.2 billion, 5% lower than last year and even lower than the $7.5 billion from 2020.
Early this year, the constant failure of the company forced Victoria’s Secret CEO Amy Hauk to resign on the heels of the poor performance.
Chen also reported that along with going back to its former sexy image, the company was also planning to revive the fashion show with its famed “Angels” walking the catwalk.
In the end, the wokening was an abject failure. And Victoria’s Secret chief executive Martin Waters drily noted, “Despite everyone’s best endeavors, it’s not been enough to carry the day.”
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