This weekend Motrin laid a marketing whammy on themselves with a tasteless ad posted on their Mom-alogue that is just too hard to ignore. Companies generally are pretty savvy in trying to get their marketing message across so I couldn’t believe my eyes (and stay silent) when Sommer – Green & Clean Mom gave me a heads up about what can happen when a company fails to reach their target audience or worse, manage actually insult them! (Sommer is also giving away a beautiful Organic Moby Wrap so be sure to visit and enter!)
Now the controversy is raging because Motrin clearly failed to reach babywearing Moms on their Motrin Mom-alogue.To date, Twitter has now received over 2000 tweets about this issue and still counting as more Mom Bloggers get wind of this and share it with their readers. Check out Katja’s video on the overwhelming twitter response.
If you have trouble loading the video, you can read the video dialog on this ad over at Perfectly Natural Photography (thanks Barb!).
In a nutshell: Is this why you wear your baby in a sling, carrier or pouch?
- It makes you look like an “official mom“
- You are just following a trend that has questionable benefits
- You are constantly in “crying” silently in pain from back and neck pain
- But you are willing to put up with the pain for your kid
I think they were actually trying to appeal to babywearing Moms but completely missed the point in making an emotional connection with Moms, much less relate to our pain! What amazes me is that Johnson & Johnson (branch of Motrin) that has been in the business of children and parents for decades would totally misrepresent and completely miss the mark on babywearing, the benefits and extensive history.
Here’s an idea: How about an ad that celebrates baby wearing, acknowledges that baby wearing has been around forever, and discusses the benefits of carrying your baby while adding that on tough days you can count on Motrin for handling your aches and pains. The same objective but with two completely different messages!
Apparently it’s not the first time Johnson & Johnson has completely missed the mark on connecting with their main niche, moms like us! Organic Mania blogs about a retreat Johnson & Johnson had for moms where there was no child care available and breastfeeding moms were not permitted.
To add insult to injury the Motrin ad comes out during International Babywearing Week
To be fair the ad does point out a legitimate concern for some parents about back or neck pain from carrying their child, however they failed to point out that it is usually from incorrectly positioning a baby or from wearing a carrier that is poorly fitted to your body. This adds to their overall disrespectful tone in the ad. The Smart Mama also points out that those awful infant carriers do far more damage and crafted a great letter to Motrin in response to their ad. I wear Liv on my hip with the help of a pouch because it too painful to hold in my arms for any period of time without a carrier!
Now Motrin is left scrambling for a social media lesson on twitter, managing the major media damage and a boycott from parents. Oh, if I could be a fly on the wall at the ad company for Motrin on Monday morning. Eeks!
Regardless of your chosen method for toting your wee ones, I hope Moms will stand together on this. We should support each other for the decisions we each make that are best for our family. No company should be able to misrepresent or make fun of a parenting decision without understandable backlash from the Mom community.
Read the response from Motrin to Amy at Crunchy Domestic Goddess. What do you think about Motrin’s reply? Here are some suggestions from Amy for for taking further action on this issue.
I also blogged about Homeopathy As An Effective Alternative, Thankfully, we have had little use for Motrin type stuff. The homeopathy has been a wonderful alternative that I completely trust for Liv’s aches and illnesses.
What do you think about the video? Would you boycott a company for an ad like this?
These are my thoughts on living a healthy and simple life. I'm a modern mom with some simple ideas, a little common sense and a natural philosophy. This is the sanest way I know how to navigate the 21 century.
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I’m still can’t believe they ran this ad. Great post and picture Monica. It’s sad that took this approach.
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