Unilever is aiming to expand the reach of its Axe (Lynx) deodorant brand past the younger generation previously targeted with its advertising campaigns and focus on an older consumer based on the theory that individuality is attractive.

Riding high on the success of the brand’s sister product Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches campaign, Unilever has reached out to creative agency 72&Sunny Amsterdam in a bid to discard previous advertising campaigns that give a glamorized view of male beauty. In its place it aims to shift perceptions with a new global campaign to help male consumers work on their own individual style. The ad will run in the US from 18 January, following in the UK in March. It will be supported by print and outdoor campaigns.

The ad, dubbed ‘Find your Magic’, leads consumers to think that Axe can help foster your original style and steers away from previous campaigns that are now thought to be behind the times.

Fernando Desouches, global Axe brand director, says, “We’re living in an era of unprecedented freedom and acceptance — and yet what we’ve seen is that a lot of men still feel huge pressure to look and behave a certain way in order to be seen as attractive.”

Step up 72&Sunny Amsterdam. Stephanie Feeny, Head of Strategy at the agency, said, “[Axe] wanted to become the number one male grooming brand in the world, in a category they recognised was changing dramatically from when they’d first entered. Ideas of masculinity had changed and it recognised it wasn’t quite keeping pace with culture.”

Feeny continues, “Search volume in male grooming is up, it overtook searches for women’s hair last year which is indicative of how things are changing. But what’s out there in response is bedroom content – really long form – or premium and not that accessible to a mainstream audience. So we’ve started to fill that gap.”