British femtech brand Elvie is ramping up its marketing in the US as it looks to expand its business across the Atlantic.
Elvie, which makes wearable breast pumps and pelvic floor trainers, was founded in 2013. Elvie is based in the UK, but believes the US is its biggest market, founder Tania Bohler told his Modern Retail. According to Smithsonian Magazine, about 85% of breastfeeding American women used a breast pump by the early 2000s, the last time such data was available.
Elvie sells to multiple markets, including Europe and Asia, but hears from U.S. customers that there isn't enough postpartum care in the United States. Two months ago, Elvie surveyed 1,000 US women with children to understand the biggest challenges they face after giving birth. The findings have now been published as a research report and form the basis of Elvie's new marketing campaign.
The centerpiece of this effort is Elvie's first large-scale outdoor advertising in the United States, a billboard in New York City's Times Square. The signs are animated and cycle through the concerns expressed in the report, such as “anxiety,” “bleeding,” and “loneliness.” Elvie's billboard debuts Tuesday and will remain up for four weeks.
“Women have told us so many different symptoms and problems that they feel like they are suffering in silence after giving birth,” Bohrer said. “So we thought, ‘Well, what if we put it on a billboard in the busiest square in New York?’…Part of our brand is to focus on issues that people don’t talk about, and to make them very and to do it in an unusual way.”
The rest of Elvie's multichannel campaign includes digital and social ads, a dedicated episode of Boler's podcast “Skin Like a Rhino,” and articles on Elvie's website and research partner Mother.ly. Elvie plans to measure the effectiveness of her campaign through visits to her landing page, foot traffic near her billboard, and visibility on her website on Mother.ly.
Elvie wanted the campaign to shine a light on the obstacles that mothers in the United States face when it comes to their health, Boler said. Elvie is based in the UK, has a publicly funded healthcare system and offers up to 52 weeks of paid maternity leave. Meanwhile, the United States, where Elvie launched its first insured breast pump in 2021, does not have universal health insurance. The US is also the only high-income country that does not guarantee paid leave, including parental leave, according to the newspaper. “Frankly, it remains shocking that there is so little support for women in the postpartum period in the United States,” Boler said.
Alexandra Sourbis, Elvie's senior public relations manager, told Modern Retail that in the past, Elvie had primarily run small-scale, guerrilla-style marketing campaigns in the United States. However, after working on a new research report and also participating in her March 2024 campaign run by Paid Leave for All, Elvie has pushed for a larger and more interactive campaign in the US.
“We have such a wealth of information and we know that people are interested in talking about this right now,” Sobis said. “This is an election year. So much is at stake and so much has been said when it comes to women's maternal rights and things related to women's health. The time is right. I feel that.”
Elvie, which raised $80 million in funding in 2021, previously ran other outdoor campaigns. In London in 2022, signs were put up that dripped water on passersby to warn people about incontinence. The previous year, the company installed a “lactation bench” in Belgium. In 2019, Elvie installed inflatable breasts across London as part of its #FreeTheFeed campaign to combat stigma against breastfeeding in public.
OOH campaigns were popular before the pandemic, but have declined as people stay at home and buy more online. However, OOH has rebounded in recent years as consumers spend more time outdoors and commuting. As Google phases out third-party cookies, traditional advertising methods are also being enhanced.
According to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, OOH advertising revenue grew 2.1% from 2022 to 2023, totaling $8.7 billion. In 2023, out of the top 100 OOH spending companies, one in five was a technology brand or a direct-to-consumer brand, but brands of all types are using OOH advertising to get consumers' attention. using.
For example, in December 2022, Peace Out Skincare promoted its new Acne Day Dot by installing 17 billboards in Los Angeles and placing ads at the entrances of New York City subway stations. In May 2023, Bombas launched his first OOH campaign in five years to highlight facts about the reality of homelessness. He placed 300 ads on billboards, bus stops, and newsstands throughout New York City.
Brands may compete for OOH ad space, but the best campaigns are memorable and take their audience into account, Kevin Bartanian, founder and CEO of OOH media sales company Kevani, told Modern Retail. . “To tell a story well at OOH, in order to tell a story that will capture the attention of your target audience, you must first understand them,” he said.
“We don’t want to sell products, we want to sell experiences and benefits,” he said. “We think this campaign is particularly interesting because it ties into common challenges and emotions faced by Elvie’s target market, so it will have emotional resonance with our audience.”
