Being someone who works in the ad industry: there aren’t any such rules in the U.S. No network or government agency is forcing advertisers to increase the diversity depicted in their ads, or meet certain quotas.
As several have noted, many advertisers have instituted policies, at varying levels of strictness, about ensuring that their ads are depicting people who are more broadly representative of all of their target than they were in the past. In many cases, it’s an outgrowth of companies instituting DE&I (diversity, equity & inclusion) policies across their operations. But, as has been noted, it really comes down to “sell more stuff.”
And, yes, there are a few brands, like Cheerios, which are, likely, trying to actively court social media buzz by pushing the envelope a bit more than others.
I wonder if we will finally reach a point where the “final frontier” of TV advertising is finally reached, where a mixed race couple is shown in a home security commercial as the robbers instead of always being two shlubby white guys.
Oh, yeah. I’ve been noticing that for years. Early on it seemed like it was mostly white guy/other girl. Now, you’re seeing more of a balance. This has been happening for at least 7-8 years.
I think you underestimate the capability of how long they can carry a grudge. Look at all the fuss when Confederate statues started being removed and that’s a hundred years after they were erected, never mind dating back 160 to the Lost Cause itself.
I’ve noticed this myself, but don’t care. I do remember the first couple like this I saw many years ago now, and it was so new that there were still some markets the commercial didn’t get shown in; It was for Cheerios, and I thought it was funny because the little girl was dumping cereal on daddy’s stomach.
Seems like it’s been this way here in Canada for a long while already. I seem to recall some US advertiser had tested a gay couple in a soup ad, maybe? As there was a large and immediate, hew and cry, it was quickly gone. This was some years ago now, I noticed that was when this type of advertising really was a noticeable change here. Muslims in headcovering, Sikhs with turbans, I don’t even notice any more!
After 2020, I noticed that Canadian commercials with some non-white actors went up maybe 10% but commercials with exclusively Black actors went up roughly infinity% (from basically zero to some). Just my experience, though.
The way I see it, when you start including a more diverse group of people in your advertisements it’s a sign that social changes have already taken place. Ads are typically conservative in that they’re not meant to challenge potential customers. When I started seeing print advertising marketed to gay people it was a sign gay people were becoming more accepted.
Not TV, but I’ve noticed interracial couples as prominent on in-store advertising since the 90s. On one occasion, a local group of hayseeds vandalized a Walmart banner because it depicted a picnic setting with a white woman and a black man.
Not true. They are VERY frequently cast and in fact represent the most desirable demo for commercials casting agents. The problem is that once you get hair and makeup applied and put them into the generic wardrobe that’s typical of national ads they end up looking like the generic white brunette person. Casting Latinos tends to be the ethnicity-neutral choice. Doesn’t help that there’s more intermarriage between Latinos and Whites in comparison to other races making a lot of Latino-identifying actors 1/4 to 1/2 Latino (which is also true of census data for the record).
My understanding is that the US is currently approx 58% white, 19% hispanic, 12.5% Black, and 6% Asian.
I have a friend who has suggested that in many print catalogs, the models do not come close to representing those percentages. Not saying it is good or bad. I just wonder what markets the vendors are going after.
An article that supports many of the observations made in this thread:
I’m still wondering if social media runs more ads that are more purely targeted at specific racial and ethnic groups, using proxies of group identification. I am so far unable to find anything to support or falsify that hypothesis.
I have too, and if they’re not interracial, the family is headed by either two men, or two women.
Several years ago, if a young woman was in a commercial, she almost always looked obviously pregnant, whether she really was or not.
I’m old enough to remember when they started using black people in commercials. Yes, Virginia, commercials used to be white-people only except for minority-oriented channels or programming; I do remember seeing Spanish-language commercials with all Hispanic actors when I was in the Phoenix area in 1985.
Nah, the actual removal of Confederate statues was novel and shocking. Large numbers of people started saying, and even legislating, that these big lumps of granite and bronze that had “Always” Been There should now suddenly Not Be There. That may have been long overdue, as you suggest, but it was definitely a striking and distinct change when it did happen.
I agree that regressive bigots’ grudging endurance of things that rub their bigotry the wrong way should not be mistaken for real acquiescence, but I think the average regressive bigot really will forget within a few years that interracial families used to be taboo in commercials.
