After over 10 years of scantily-clad and sexist ad campaigns, Carl's Jr has finally decided to throw in the towel over the whole “women’s bodies are for the male gaze” mantra for a campaign that focuses on the food itself (which, for other companies is small, but for Carl's Jr is huge). Still, as great of an achievement as this is, why now? Well, the answer lies in the ever-so-charming former CEO of CKE (Carl's Jr parent company) Andrew Puzder, coupons and a survey.
According to Kate Taylor of entrepreneur.com, Puzder’s focus has always been on what every CEO’s main focus is: making money. Back in 2015 after a Super Bowl ad featuring Charlotte Mckinney was found offensive by 52% of its viewers, Puzder still did nothing about the campaign, because the bottom line was that the company believed the ad garnered attention, the attention led to sales and that was all that mattered. Puzder didn't care if it led to girl’s self esteem issues or made every household in America with children uncomfortable. If the ad made them money, then the ad was a success. However, Sean Scott, a senior brand consultant with Ameritest (an advertising firm) states that the real reason the burger advertised did so well was because of coupons, not because of some random hot chick.
The Washington Post wrote that Puzder stated that these ads aren't working the way they should because “young, hungry guys” can look at models whenever they want online, and so the appeal of looking at girls in a commercial isn't the same as it used to be back in the day. Instead, guys nowadays are more interested in knowing where their food comes from and how they cook their food to begin with (how shocking!) Carl's Jr is changing because they're still trying to market to those same hungry guys, and are still not focused on appealing to the other half of their advertising pool (aka women.)
If you watch the new apology ad, it focuses on the father/son dynamic of Carl Hardee Sr. and Carl Jr, and Carl Sr shames his son for the stupidity of the brand and advertising. It may point out how embarrassing for the company the ads were, but never mentions the long-lasting effect on women the ads have had. It doesn't take back 10 years of blatant misogyny, it doesn't take back the generation of girls who grew up and learned that without boobs or a nice butt they were worthless, but instead basically says, “Hey! Wasn't all that model stuff stupid? Let's have a laugh about it and move on and never bring it up again because it was embarrassing for us.”
It's like when you're at a party and someone you're friends with makes a rape joke and apologizes for it after; the fact that they even thought to do something like that in the first place makes you uncomfortable and concerned, and the apology only seems like a way to make THEM feel better, and not to actually apologize and acknowledge how the joke contributes to a harmful culture that does not treat women as equals.
Basically, Carl's Jr has never been invested in progressive ideology. It's invested in making burgers that make them money, and for anyone to believe that Carl's Jr is deciding now to change their ad campaigns because they believe Carl's Jr is trying to be more forward-thinking and not because they're realizing boobs don't make them money is pulling the wool over their eyes.
