“I have a crazy idea”, Joanna Griffiths, Founder and CEO, announced to Team Knix earlier this year. The crazy idea? To honor International Women’s Day by shining a spotlight on women over the age of 50— a powerful population of women who have been historically ignored and underrepresented.
It’s always been right there in our mission statement after all: that we believe it’s time all women lived totally, unapologetically free. And we mean ALL women. If you haven’t seen the video yet, you can watch and share it here.
We caught up with Joanna to talk about the inspiration for the campaign, why it’s more relevant than ever, and why she thinks other brands should start taking notice.
How do you think this campaign celebrates women?
We wanted to make this video because a weird thing happens in society where when women get to a certain age, we pretend that they don’t exist. We stop seeing them in advertising and marketing, and at Knix we wanted to celebrate the fact that all women are beautiful. They’re gorgeous at any age, exactly how they are. And we wanted to celebrate that.
It’s hard to believe but we actually have 4 decades of women in this campaign. We have women in their 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. And every single one of them is just owning their super power which is being genuine and authentic to who they are.
What do you hope people take away from this video?
I hope people are blown away by this video. I’m really excited about the song we’ve chosen and I’m so excited to be working with Soleil Denault, the director. I hope that people are stopped in their tracks and see something they haven’t seen before, because I’m pretty sure that a lingerie ad hasn’t shown women over the age of 50 before, and I want them to be like “Yeah… it’s about time!”
I think there are two things that I want people to take away from this video. For the people who watch it, I’d love for them to feel really excited and moved and like they want to share this content because it’s so different and special from the things that they’ve seen before. And I’d love for the broader industry to take notice and finally recognize that it’s time as a society we really celebrate women of all ages.
What’s been the best part of this experience so far?
Best part of the experience is reading all of the comments. Especially the ones where people are commenting about how they're crying and don’t know why. I didn’t fully understand how badly the world needed to see this— how defiant it is from everything we have been told to believe as a gender, and how freeing it is to finally start to breakdown the stereotypes. I feel like we shifted the conversation...and we shifted what people believed was possible from a brand. And that is pretty incredible.
Why do you think it’s important for brands to have these kinds of age-inclusive conversations?
I think it’s important for brands like Knix to have these kinds of conversations because we're the challenger brands. We’re fearless, and we’re the ones willing to take a bit of a risk to do something bold that makes the industry take notice.
Ideally we’ll create a ripple effect where something you’ve never seen before— you start to see more and more in other forms of advertising and in the pages of magazines. Without brands like Knix starting the conversation, I think it would take longer to happen.
Look ahead 30 years from now. Do you have any words for your future self?
30 years from now I’ll be 66 years old. I honestly think I watch this video and I’m reminded that I’m still a badass, and I’m still beautiful and confident. And I hope that I have just as much mojo and awesomeness as all the women on set today. It’s a real celebration.
We’re celebrating International Women’s Day all month long. Follow along here, @Knixwear and on Youtube for more behind the scenes and interviews with all the amazing women in the campaign.