Marketing to Men - a Conundrum of Conflicting Values

With Father's Day on the horizon, I was planning to feature The MacBath's shave soaps on social media - many Dads are men! Many men shave! It seemed like a no-brainer.

But then I hit a snag. What, exactly, should I say about this soap in an attempt to appeal to a population buying almost exclusively for men? I have been following the #masculinitysofragile movement with great glee (buzzfeed does an excellent roundup here and here - go and enjoy a good laugh at what marketing departments think the average cis male needs to make a purchase.). I didn't want to fall into any of these lazy gendered marketing pitfalls by trying to position the soap as "ultra manly" or using violence and danger as shorthand for "men". (See the grenade shaped bath bomb in the buzzfeed article above.)   

So on the one hand, I'd like to get some shave soap in the hands of some Dads on Father's Day. On the other hand, I don't want to stoop to weird gendered marketing tactics that reduce all men everywhere to a caveman stereotype. So what's the solution?

I hope that you like what I came up with. I present to you: The MacBath's first ever commercial.

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