Selling Feminism: A study of Romanian women's attitudes to femvertising and brand activism

Abstract: This study explores the impact of female empowering advertisements from a consumer’s perspective. The aim of this research is to investigate the influence of femvertising on the purchase intention and the attitude towards the brand. It also examines the emotional impact of femvertising. This study used qualitative interviews with open ended questions in order to answer the research questions. The sample consisted of 20 Romanian women aged between 17 and 52 years old. They were asked to watch three female empowering ads and react to them. This study draws attention to the positive effects of femvertising. The findings confirmed that there is a higher chance to purchase the product after being exposed to femvertising. Also, after viewing the ads, a significant number of participants had a more positive attitude towards the brand. Femvertising also had a great positive emotional impact on its viewers, especially in the case of the brands Barbie and Reebok. Furthermore, the vast majority of participants considered sharing these ads on their social media or discussing them with their friends and family in order to support feminist values and teach others about gender equality. This research proves that female empowering advertisements are a powerful tool in marketing campaigns and they attract female customers. Therefore marketers should consider embracing these types of ads. This study is unique in the sense that it is the only one analysing the effect of femvertising on Romanian women by using qualitative interviews.