Ruth La Ferla writes,

A 27-year-old single mother from South Shields near Newcastle in England, Ms. Luke is nothing if not approachable. She is the kind of open-faced, plain-spoken Englishwoman you might expect to encounter at the butcher shop or corner pub. With her plump proportions and pretty if nondescript features, she seems an unlikely candidate to shake up the beauty world. And yet it appears she is doing just that.

For those of you in the know, Luke's an internet cosmetics maven and YouTube sensation who's garnered millions of views, a book deal and a cosmetics line. The Times piece quotes a few experts explaining her trick: says one department store buying director, "Her appeal is that she is the Everywoman...She connects on an emotional level, and her quirky honesty is infectious." And the editor of Allure says women like her because she's "not a threat."

This sort of patronizing rhetoric reminds me of the hundreds of attempts to "analyze" Susan Boyle's appeal. How about the fact that we just like real people? A new study finds that celebrities have little to no effect on our buying power; why is it still some kind of revelation to these experts that a normal, straightforward person is appealing to us? "Normalcy" is not a novelty or a marketing gimmick to most of us. It's just...normal.

Sometimes it seems like many who make ads and magazines and generally create our perception of beauty actually don't understand this. They say they do, because that's what you're supposed to say. Everyone knows we're supposed to celebrate "real women" in all their beautiful diversity. But the mindset is genuinely different. I recently read the memoir by Jean Godfrey-June, the relatively down-to-earth beauty editor of Lucky, formerly of Elle. She paid lip-service to a variety of beauties, and to avoiding unnecessary procedures. But at the end of the day, the assumptions were: you want to be thin and look young. Everyone wants to look like models because they're the most beautiful. And I doubt she was even aware of it: she was so ingrained with these standards that the notion of anything else was literally inconceivable. The thinking seemed to be, "yes, lots of women are beautiful...but you do want to be thin, right?" Or take Liz Jones. A bit off her rocker, yes. But when she admits freely that she, as a magazine editor, found women who were not, like her, anorexic, "disgusting," one has the uncomfortable feeling that she may not be alone. And she, mind you, is a theoretical advocate of expanding the standards of fashionable beauty!

And yet, when Susan Boyle or Lauren Luke takes off, it's a novelty. It's an aberration. The thought goes, what's going on with us that this appeals to you? You're supposed to like models! Doesn't it strike people that, as soon as we have access to self-produced media, the opportunity to make our own choices, we're choosing "average?" Editors know that actors sell more magazines than models: does it occur to them that this has to do with accessibility and presuming to know a bit more about them? That we relate even more to regular joes? Or is this a bridge too far? Sure, people still love the aspirational ideal, and always will. But I believe part of this is because that's what's presented, not just as routine, but with conviction. When we see a Dove ad, we know we're being shown "real women" and the condescension and the self-congratulation are palpable. It's not merely showing a variety of people, Elle: it's believing it. Not because we're not threatened. But because we're not stupid.

An Everywoman As Beauty Queen [NY Times]

Related: Most Claim To Be Unswayed By Celebrities In Ads [AdWeek]
Commentary: Why We're Fascinated By Susan Boyle [CNN]
The Appeal Of Susan Boyle [Huffington Post]

Earlier: Is This Woman Actually "Mad"? Results Inconclusive, Fascinating
The Inconvenient Truth Behind Dove, The Love-Your-Body Beauty Company

What with the economy in the tank and all, and Mad Men a cultural phenom, "Advertising" (which as we know is a big amorphous entity, kind of like "Media") is turning to nostalgia. Says a guy at Pepsi, which is unveiling some retro packaging: ""It's about yearning for the past, a simpler time, even though the '60s and '70s were not simple...They just seem simple, looking back."

Like Pepsi, the usual Capitalist suspects - think Mickey D's, Coke and General Mills - are resorting to vintage jingles and old timey logos to foster a sense of security and, presumably, both retro-low pricing and antique quality. Even in cases like Target, which didn't actually exist in the eras it's seeking to evoke. The results, however subconsciously comforting, are consciously mixed: for every "Fabric of Our Lives" return (Zooey Deschanel's apparently covering it, no less) there's an annoying "Meet the Buttertons," with all the subtlety of a Sam Mendes take on suburban malaise. And the "How Many Licks" Tootsie Pop campaign has yet to make its appearance - possibly due to unfortunate Urban Outfitters Ironic Shirt associations.

While the trends are obviously demo-driven, it's still peculiar to think that we're harking back not merely to times of tremendous civil and cultural unrest, but also economic instability. Are we supposed to take a "this too shall pass" attitude, or merely remember a time when we were too young to care? Alternatively, is the message more profound? Here, says PepsiCo, was Joy. In the midst of life we are in death. Live each day to the fullest because youth is not eternal. Or - horrifyingly - is this movement a cultural Dorian Gray of sorts? Are we just plastering over our problems with vintage packaging and familiar pabulum? I guess the answer will be in the numbers. (Which, ideally, will be brought to us via Mathnet.)

Warm And Fuzzy Makes A Comeback [NY Times]
The Touch, The Feel Of Nostalgia [AdAge]

There are a few variations on this campaign. In one, a woman lights a Glade candle in the bath. When a friend calls, she tells her she's at the spa. In the next iteration, a woman lights a Glade candle, then tells her friends it's some expensive scent "from France." "You mean you've never heard of Glah-day?!" shouts her friend, triumphantly, as she rips the giveaway Glade label off the liar's back. Then there's the "yoga" ad, where the deceitful woman explains the fresh smell as something she uses to "plug into her karma." "DON'T YOU MEAN GLADE PLUG-INS?" crows her friend upon espying the telltale dispenser.

It's an innocuous — if annoying — campaign, and I get the logic behind it: in strapped times, people want nice things for cheap, and Glade wants to take its image upmarket. But there's something weird about the psychology of 'deceit ads' - pretending frozen pizzas have been delivered; that Sara Lee tortes are from fancy bakeries; that Pillsbury pastries are made from scratch; that canned broth is "a family secret." Some of it seems like a holdover from a time when convenience products were stigmatized, but the odd culture of 'women lying to their friends' — and it's always women — is somewhat unsettling to the overthinker, as if always implicit is the notion of female competition — and based on products, no less.

Of course, the commercials universe is a grotesque one in which husbands are invariably buffoons, people get strangely excited about fast food, and children speak exclusively in sassy one-liners. The odd deceit culture is of a piece with this; but the fact that these approaches have, one assumes, been strenuously market-and focus-tested and somehow found to appeal to women is bizarre. According to Marti Berletta, female shoppers are eminently practical: the marketer is advised that women prize "price over value," "thrift over convenience," "sustainables over disposables" and "essentials over indulgences." Nowhere does she mention status-conscious deceit, and indeed, lately there seems to be a palpable pride in bargain-hunting at work which is at odds with this.

That said, for all my bafflement and manufactured outrage, I was moved to sniff a Glade candle at the supermarket the other day: annoying or not, the ads had obviously made an impression - so had they worked? The candle smelled exactly like one of those blue-water scent things in a particularly grimy restaurant toilet. And at the end of the day, you can only deceive us so much.

Related: How To Market To Women During The Economic Upheaval [AdAge]

Take the magazine's regular front-of-book feature 'Shopping Deconstructed' — seen at right — which purports to explain to readers why being fashionable costs so damn much. The August installment breaks down a pair of Diesel 'Rancho Deluxe' jeans, presenting an insider's view of the stitching, fabric, and little details that make the 'Rancho Deluxe', so, well, luxe. (Check out the video accompaniment to the feature here; is it just us or does shopping editor Zoe Glassner get a slightly-scary second-degree from Marie Claire's editor in chief, Joanna Coles?) The implication of 'Shopping Deconstructed' is that, with a few well-placed call-outs, Marie Claire can prove there's a good reason why anyone should want — nevermind spend — over half a grand on a pair of denim pants. "Rust-colored ferric oxide lends a patina of bygone luxury to the inside lining" explains one call-out. "Each all-metal (no nickel) zipper tooth is polished by hand" says another.

Well, congratulations to Diesel designers for their unabashed creativity — yes, we own a few pairs! — but honestly, so what? Fashion editors can gush about handiwork and "airdrying" and "four-hour" washes and "antique" treatments until they turn blue in the face. Doing so still doesn't mean — or prove — anything. The problem remains that women's magazine editors who purport to "serve the reader" often do exactly the opposite, even with stories as seemingly benign but inherently dishonest as 'Shopping Deconstructed'. In fact, due to their fear of taking a stand against expensive shit, editors send a tacit message of approval to advertisers that they can continue to push overpriced consumer goods down everyone's throats. Because when the majority of the fashions featured in a magazine fall on the outrageous end of the price scale — and yes, Marie Claire shows some "cheaper" jeans in a denim feature in the same issue, although the average price of those jeans is still a whopping $153 — that majority becomes the new "normal". And yet there's nothing normal about $550 jeans (o $153 jeans, really) no matter what Marie Claire editors, assorted Hollywood style 'icons', or the executives at Diesel, Habitual, or Miss Sixty would have us to believe. Maybe it's time for magazines like Marie Claire to just drop the charade altogether and subtitle their fashion features "For Average Household Incomes Of $100,000 And Up". At least then they'd be honest to readers and keep the class-conscious luxury advertisers happy at the same time.

The Masthead With Marie Claire: Episode 14 [MarieClaire]

• Those Sisley cocaine-snorting ads? Not exactly real. Which makes us sad because we really wanted to see something realistic in a fashion magazine. [Sassybella]
  
• You know how sometimes we read too quickly and make up, like, an alternate news story? Um, we didn't with this. You actually can turn peanuts into diamonds. [The Budget Fashionista]
  
• Two-thirds of English consumers are happy with their collection of fake bags. And the other 33% would have rather coughed up a few grand on the real thing? [BBC]

• Lord & Taylor is spending $10 million on a "brand makeover" that will attempt to make you see it as more like Nordstrom. [WWD]
• Sayeth the lawyer representing Anna Sui in her case, one of many about the stealing of designs, against Forever 21: "I believe that Forever 21's business model is to copy the designs of other well-known designers." Um, ya think? [WWD, sub req'd]
• American Eagle is giving potential shoppers a free movie ticket for trying on a pair of jeans? That is really convenient, since, um, we were trying to figure out a way to see I Now Pronounce You Chick And Larry without actually, you know, funding the evildoers. [Reuters]

Fab Ad? Sisley Fashion Junkie, 1 [FabSugar]

Photodropping 100 Pounds Away From This Model [Back In Skinny Jeans via Dethroner]
Related: Evolution Of Beauty — Dove Campaign For Real Beauty [YouTube]