Barbiecore: Aesthetic-forward marketing in the digital social age
Megan Collins is a Cultural Anthropologist, Generational Expert and contributor to the MTD blog
It looks like Warner Brothers has the blockbuster of the summer on its hands with the Barbie movie. Written by married couple Greta Gerwig & Noah Baumbach, directed by Gerwig, starring producer Margot Robbie opposite Ryan Gosling, and featuring a star studded cast, we can see why they have high hopes. The red carpet premiere took place here in LA on Sunday & early reports are applauding the film that currently boasts a 100% score on Rotten Tomatoes. Overall, it looks like the HUGE marketing swing that’s drummed up anticipation will pay off at the box office come July 21st.
When we say HUGE we mean Malibu mansion HUGE. By now you’ve probably seen at least one piece of marketing for the Barbie movie. The world has all but been blanketed in pink the past few months:
The campaign debuted with a full court press from the cast posting their “this Barbie is a…” posters across social media and debuting a website where people could create their own. Since then, fans & marketers have been noting the Barbie pink billboards appearing everywhere and that’s just the beginning…
Amid the writer’s strike (& therefore a dearth of late night & daytime TV) the cast has been on a “world tour” where Margot Robbie is drumming up press by paying homage to iconic Barbie outfits throughout the ages
Each week they’ve been dropping a song from the Mark Ronson-produced soundtrack with iconic artists like Nicki Minaj & Ice Spice, Dua Lipa, Billie Eilish & more.
There have been so many product collabs and partnerships that one Twitter user went viral simply for creating a thread of marketing activations. This became the go-to place to see a list of collabs to the point that Crocs got in on the action to post their own collab.
And that’s just the official brand-led activations! This marketing campaign has also inspired a host of earned and organic marketing such as an AI filter, a short-lived effect mimicking the “This Barbie is…” posters, and, ofc, memes.
One of the major reasons for this successful strategic explosion of relevance for this film is the through line of Barbiecore.
Interestingly, as Mattel CEO, Ynon Kreiz, pointed out to TIME “[Barbiecore] didn’t just happen.” Was he suggesting that Mattel “planted” Barbiecore? Was he in cahoots with Valentino to make hot pink chic again? While there was a lot of buzz around filming and the cast's outfits specifically, I don’t think so. But I do think he was pointing to how they capitalized on their moment of relevance by being willing to meaningfully & authentically engage with the iconography they created.
Barbie is indeed an icon. As Lindsey Weber co-host of the Who? Weekly podcast so concisely and accurately pointed out on a recent episode of her show, “[The Barbie movie] has every single marketing opportunity you could have in a movie… like every single thing is possible: dress her in costumes, Barbie dream house in Malibu? We’ll partner with airbnb! Even the stupidest mind could come up with 45 Barbie ideas that could be good.” While joking, Lindsay is hitting on something very true: Barbie is a brand so iconic, recognizable and established within our collective cultural understanding that it’s incredibly accessible. “As the trailer posits, “If you love Barbie, this movie is for you. If you hate Barbie, this movie is for you.”” (TIME)
The Barbie movie and Barbiecore the aesthetic, are both part of a larger shift that cultural analysts like me have been tracking for several years now involving the interrogation of 2nd & 3rd wave feminism and its key figures. Most recently, there’s been increased cultural interest in aesthetics, icons, and trends from the early 2000s. People are donning baby tees, bedazzling everything, and jean waistlines are trending lowrise. But as we reminisce nostalgically about wanting a bedazzled sidekick like Paris Hilton used to have, we’re also revisiting and revising our collective narrative around the heiress. With the benefit of hindsight we see how, while incredibly privileged and entitled, Paris was also a victim of patriarchy and misogyny.
Here we run into the chicken & egg conundrum. Are we revisiting Y2k and hyper-feminine aesthetics because we want to rewrite these types of wrongs around patriarchy & misogyny? OR are aesthetics simply a gateway drug that then forces us to collectively grapple with the skeletons stored next to the juicy track suits in the back of our closets?
That’s the beauty of a trending aesthetic, it allows for us to engage as vapidly or deeply as we’d like in a shared cultural context. The Barbie movie understands this and offers both: “If you are wondering whether Barbie is a satire of a toy company’s capitalist ambitions, a searing indictment of the current fraught state of gender relations, a heartwarming if occasionally clichéd tribute to girl power, or a musical spectacle filled with earworms from Nicki Minaj and Dua Lipa, the answer is yes. All of the above. And then some. (TIME)”
Based on early reviews & reporting, it seems that Greta Gerwig was given the creative control (that Amy Schumer felt she was denied) to make this project her own. To those of us who are fans of Gerwig’s overtly feminist and existential oeuvre, allowing her to direct felt like a bold choice from Warner Bros & Mattel. Perhaps you’ve heard the bit of filmmaking lore that speaks to the dynamic between Barbie IP owner Mattel & the auteur. After reading a particular scene in the script that he felt was “off brand” the CEO visited the set only to be convinced by Margot Robbie acting it for him live at Gerwig’s insistence. Even this tale acts as marketing for the film buffs and press to buzz about!
By entrusting Greta Gerwig & Margot Robbie with Barbie’s image, they were able to tell an authentic story that speaks to the brand’s mythology and iconic role in culture and it’s resonating BIG TIME. And all this in anticipation alone, before the film is released! That seems to be exactly what Mattel wanted, “We’re looking to create movies that become cultural events,” Kreiz says, and to do that Mattel needs visionaries to produce something more intriguing than a toy ad. “If you can excite filmmakers like Greta and Noah to embrace the opportunity and have creative freedom, you can have a real impact.” (TIME) In other words, Barbiecore didn’t just happen, Mattel opened up their IP for exploration, celebration, and along with that came a loving critique. This is what social media experts have been saying about working with creators and influencers forever!