A Brazilian beer company hired six female illustrators to paint over its old ads, which featured scantily clad women.
“These images are part of our past, but the world has evolved, and so has Skol, and this doesn’t represent us anymore,” says the beer company in its newest campaign, which it called “Reposter.”
One artist, who uses only the name Criola, said she decided to participate in Skol’s new campaign because “it’s important to deconstruct stereotypes, preconceived notions.”
In several of the female artists’ renderings, the women are drinking the beers they hold rather than serving them. The illustrated women also aren’t stick-skinny, like the bikini models formerly featured by Skol. In one new poster, the illustrated woman wears a shirt that reads, “The Future Is Female.”
AdWeek applauded Skol’s campaign in a write-up this week.
“’Reposter’ actually succeeds at making sexism look tired, providing vivid and refreshing rebuttals to the platitude ‘sex sells’,” writer Angela Natividad said. “But what we really love about this is how openly Skol owned its own problematic past, and sought actively and openly to change it.”
Skol’s campaign comes as the beer industry increasingly grapples with charges of sexism. In the past year, several breweries have come under fire for racy beer names or labels. And last month, All About Beer Magazine vowed that it would not feature beers that are sexist, offensive or otherwise “fall into poor taste.”