Droga5 & SheaMoisture Launch Call-to-Action to #BreakTheWalls Dividing Beauty

For 25 years, Richelieu Dennis, founder and CEO of Sundial Brands, and his family have built their business based on one premise: that the beauty industry should fully serve all women.  Today, SheaMoisture, manufactured by Sundial and one of the industry's fastest-growing brands, launched its first-ever national awareness platform, #BreakTheWalls – a transformative and revolutionary multimedia effort to highlight the divisive constructs of beauty and move towards the inclusive shopping experience that all women deserve.  The first phase includes a 60-second short film, a 30-second spot, #BreakTheWalls digital and social assets and behind-the-scenes footage that highlight everyday women and beauty vloggers raising their voices to ask one simple question: "Why is our beauty not reflected in the beauty aisle?"

"I have often said over the last 20 years that the beauty aisle is the last place in America where segregation is still legal, and separating 'beauty' from 'ethnic' has only served to further perpetuate narrow standards of what is considered beautiful in our industry and our society – which is why we began leading the efforts to break down those walls," said Dennis.  "This movement is about so much more than selling shampoo, or lotion, or cosmetics.  We're advancing a mission and vision to change the social dialogue about how we're looking at beauty as a society and how those archaic structures and views are debilitating to the establishment of new and more inclusive ways of viewing beauty – whether in the images we see or in the aisles that divide."

SheaMoisture's call to "break the walls" is the first-of-its-kind in the beauty industry, but has been an imperative for the brand since its inception – even taking 16 years for the brand to come to retail shelves because of Dennis' refusal to conform to traditional merchandising segmentation and his efforts to ensure that women who had been underserved by the beauty industry had ample access to an assortment of products to meet their lifestyle needs.  Creating an enhanced and more inclusive beauty experience has been a charge that SheaMoisture has led directly through engagement with its retail partners and with its diverse community of women around their needs and desired experiences – particularly wanting an experience which didn't ignore or devalue the needs of women with textured hair, whether wavy, curly, kinky or coily.

Aligned with its community engagement approach, the brand issued an open casting call for the film on its social media channels to its community members – affectionately referred to as SheaFam – who shared their personal hair stories and journeys to self-love and empowerment.  The brand also enlisted influential beauty vloggers Naptural85, SunKissAlba, and MahoganyCurls to share their own powerful and inspirational stories in the film.

"With SheaMoisture, we have built a successful brand by recognizing that beauty comes in every hair type, skin tone, shade, and feature and by honoring the natural beauty of every woman with natural products that address her individual needs and empower her to celebrate her unique journey," said Dennis.  "It is so exciting for us to partner with all of these women who are each, in their own way, leading the conversation with their different stories and common truths about their beauty experiences."

#BreakTheWalls is an extension of SheaMoisture's focus on what it has coined as the New General Market and ensuring that all consumers, especially those who have been traditionally underserved, have an enhanced product and shopping experience based on being served according to their needs, not traditional segmentation.  This problem-solution approach, defined by inclusion and commonalities via need states, is shifting the way CPG, retail and other consumer companies approach product development, marketing and merchandising to serve all consumers in a much more elevated way.  As a result, many retailers have increased efforts to enhance their assortments and merchandising to reflect more inclusion in the near-term, while working with consumers to gain insights and learnings that will help them determine the next level of changes that are ultimately needed to meet their customers' needs.

"It is also important to recognize our retail partners who – in embracing SheaMoisture, our message of inclusion and our efforts to elevate how all consumers are served in their stores – are indeed embracing the New General Market approach to beauty that is bringing down these arbitrary walls," said Dennis.  "#BreaktheWalls is starting with the beauty industry, but will continue to spur dialogue and action around other societal walls that exist and that serve to divide rather than unite, and this film is only the first of more in exploring these topics."

SheaMoisture partnered with Droga5 to develop the #BreakTheWalls platform and the "Break The Walls" film because of the firm's ability to understand complicated social issues and constructs and transform them into compelling, engaging and disruptive calls to action.  The effort is both a celebration of the positive changes women are experiencing in the beauty industry and a rallying cry to join together to continue to reshape the beauty landscape – from a dated model of "standardized ideals" to one of inclusive representation at shelf and beyond.

"There's an aisle called Beauty that does not include all people. It's something that women have been conditioned to accept as fact, but it's no longer acceptable,” said Emmie Nostitz, Senior Art Director, Droga5. “SheaMoisture is breaking down the walls that separate the Beauty Aisle and the Ethnic Section simply by putting their product in the Beauty Aisle. A simple change that can make a big difference”