Hindustan Unilever Limited takes the next step in the evolution of the skin care portfolio by removing the word ‘Fair’ in the brand name ‘Fair & Lovely’. New brand name to be announced after regulatory approvals.
It is always about being comfortable in your skin. Over the last decade, Fair & Lovely’s advertising has evolved to communicate a message of women’s empowerment. The brand’s vision is to adopt a holistic approach to beauty that cares for people, that must be inclusive and diverse – for everyone, everywhere. The brand is committed to celebrating all skin tones. Taking forward the brand’s journey towards a more inclusive vision of beauty, the company will stop using the word ‘Fair’ in the brand name ‘Fair & Lovely’. The new name is awaiting regulatory approvals and can be expected to change the name in the next few months.
In early 2019, the brand’s communication moved away from the benefits of fairness, whitening and skin lightening, towards the glow, even tone, skin clarity and radiance, which are holistic measures of healthy skin. HUL also removed from Fair & Lovely’s packaging, words such as ‘fair/fairness’, ‘white/whitening’, and ‘light/lightening’ that could indicate a fairness-led transformation. The cameo with two faces showing shade transformation, as well as the shade guides, were removed from the packs. The Company will continue to evolve its advertising, to feature women of different skin tones, representative of the variety of beauty across India.
We’re committed to a skin care portfolio that's inclusive of all skin tones, celebrating the diversity of beauty. That’s why we’re removing the words ‘fairness’, ‘whitening’ & ‘lightening’ from products, and changing the Fair & Lovely brand name.https://t.co/W3tHn6dHqE
— Unilever #StaySafe (@Unilever) June 25, 2020
Sanjiv Mehta, Chairman, and Managing Director, HUL said, “We are making our skin care portfolio more inclusive and want to lead the celebration of a more diverse portrayal of beauty. The changes (we made previously) were very well received by our consumers. We now announce that we will remove the word ‘Fair’ from our brand name Fair & Lovely. The new name is awaiting regulatory approvals, and the pack with the revised name will be available in the market in the next few months.”
Sunny Jain, President Beauty & Personal Care, explains, “We are fully committed to having a global portfolio of skin care brands that is inclusive and cares for all skin tones, celebrating greater diversity of beauty. We recognise that the use of the words ‘fair’, ‘white’ and ‘light’ suggest a singular ideal of beauty that we don’t think is right, and we want to address this. As we’re evolving the way that we communicate the skin benefits of our products that deliver radiant and even toned skin, it’s also important to change the language we use.”
In addition to the changes to Fair & Lovely, the rest of the skin care portfolio will also reflect the new vision of positive beauty.
About Fair and Lovely Foundation
Connecting women to opportunity:- Career guidance. High-quality education. They are vital elements to building a career and essential to empowering women. That’s especially true where socio-cultural, infrastructural or economic barriers stand in women’s way – barriers such as gender stereotyping, safety concerns about studying outside the home, or misplaced norms about household responsibilities.
Impact at Scale- The Foundation was set up in 2003 to offer women scholarships to pursue their education. In 2017, it launched a mobile-friendly career and education platform www.fairandlovelyfoundation.in as a holistic solution. This mobile platform offers career guidance as well as a curated selection of courses. The courses are chosen from well-regarded, high-quality digital education partners such as edX.org (founded by Harvard and MIT), the IT skills training firm, NIIT Limited, and English Edge, an English language training specialist.
