While it might seem a bit weird for the Prince’s Trust to be partnering up with a Self Esteem campaign run by St Tropez, a fake tan company, in the first place, it would appear the good ol’ PT have woken up, and pulled out as a partner in the campaign.
The ladies at PinkStinks in addition to Susie Orbach, the psychologist, and the authors Ed Mayo and Sue Palmer all wrote to chief executive of the trust, Marina Milburn and asked her to dissociate the trust from the campaign.
Why all the fuss?
Instead of Kelly Osbourne, the campaign’s spokesperson, making the focus of the campaign be the health benefits of using fake tan verses frying outside in the sun, in a video for the campaign, Kelly went on about how after using the product, she looked “like, 10lb skinnier” and that it “started to make me look at my body in a different way.”
Um, not the point.
As Emma from PinkStinks says, “There are so many damaging and mixed messages. They are talking about self-esteem and then there are pictures of Kelly Osbourne airbrushed to within an inch of her life. To have those messages endorsed by a high-profile charity seemed very wrong.”
This whole campaign doesn’t sit right with me.
Of course the use of makeup and fake tanning products (CEO Michelle Feeney prefers the term “skin finishing”) all boils down to self esteem. We use lipstick and makeup because of how it makes us feel. But for some reason a campaign about tanning products blatantly called Self Esteem (never mind it being backed by the Princes’ Trust) just feels really off. Like a Dove “Real Beauty” campaign gone horrible wrong.
Of course Feeney thinks that what St Tropez is doing, and their products “add value to the person because it makes you feel so good about yourself” – but when Osbourne says things like “Oh, use fake tanner because it’ll make you feel thinner and therefore better about yourself”, it doesn’t exactly work, does it?
With thanks to PinkStinks, the Prince's Trust is no longer endorsing the campaign, but St Tropez say that they are going to continue to “honour its commitment to make a donation to The Prince’s Trust” with every sale.
Well that was nice of them.