Tide advert.

A WOMAN'S ROLE IN THE 1950'S AND 60'S.

The role of the average 1950’s woman was very different to what we see today. Back in the
1950’s and 60’s, it was unusual to see a woman working once married. This is because society
expected them to become housewives, taking care of all the cooking and cleaning in the house,
whilst looking after her children and remaining flawlessly beautiful.

During the Second World War, while the men were away fighting for their country, the women
were forced, by the government, to take over their husbands jobs. However, in the mid to late
1940’s, the men were returning from battle and taking their jobs back. This meant that women
had once again returned to their roles as housewives.

Less than a decade after the end of the Second World War, the men were regarded as the head
of the household once again. This meant that as well as working they were in charge of all
important matters, for example, mortgages and bank accounts.

THE TIDE ADVERT ANALYSIS.

This advert, for Tide washing powder, uses a bold font to draw the viewer’s eye to the slogan
(and the title) of the product. The bright red colour has been strategically selected to make the
audience focus on the keywords of the advert such as “Tide” and “Clean”. The slogan “Tides
got what women want.” personifies the product, making it seem like an attractive man for the
women to chase after. This is backed up by the pink hearts above the woman hugging a box of
Tide washing powder. The expression of the model appears to be one of love and longing for
the product. This further implies that the housewives of the 1950’s will fall in love with this
product. The model in this advert has been used to represent the average 1950’s housewife.
This has been done to appeal to a wider audience, making the viewer feel that they can be like
the model. The advert uses the Z-line to move the viewer's eye from the title to the illustration
and lastly onto the slogan “Tide gets clothes cleaner than every other washday product you
can buy.” this allows the mostly female audience to focus on the short lines of text and the
brightly coloured image. This follows the stereotypical idea that the housewives were not
capable of reading a long piece of text. The placement of the illustration grabs the audience’s
attention and forces them to look at the product. This happens because the human eye is
naturally attracted to the bright red. This use of colour with the white background, helping it
stand out, has been purposefully combined by the company to attract an audience and sell the
product.