New Jersey's nickname, the "Armpit of America," may or may not be deserved—it's sort of shaped like the crook of an arm, and Secaucus certainly smells like something emanating from an overripe sweat gland. But while it's one thing to lob jokes at your friends from Fair Lawn, it's quite another to insult millions of people with a giant billboard in a state that's been through hell and back. See, then, Dove's new ad campaign, which plans to use the oft-maligned moniker ...but in a nice way?
Apparently, Dove intends to put up billboards that urge Jersey denizens to "take it as a compliment" when people refer to their state as the "Armpit of America." The billboards are part of the company's new campaign for Dove Advanced Care, which seems to be trying to get women to love their axilla regions, moisturize them and display them proudly in a series of neon tank tops. "It was a very conscious decision because people view ‘armpit’ as a dirty word,” Nancy Vaznonis, a creative director at the Ogilvy & Mather ad company that handled the campaign, told the Times. “We wanted to change the preconception of it as dirty."
Along with serving New Jersey a nice backhanded compliment, the campaign plans to air commercials featuring open letters to armpits, and calling out razors for scraping off skin. The company, which is based in Englewood Cliffs, NJ, says they want women to know their armpits need to be cleansed and moisturized just like every other part of the body, so if you weren't self-conscious enough about that weird birthmark under there, now you can start freaking out about scaly razor stubble too. "Women don’t really see the skin of their underarms like the skin on the rest of their body,” Mr. McCarthy said. “When they think about their underarms, they think mostly about odor and wetness." Just like New Jersey!
Governor Chris Christie's office and the NJ Board of Tourism have not responded to requests for comment. The billboard is set to debut around NJ this summer, just in time for prime pit sweat season.
