Beauty Brand Billie Razors Ask ‘What If We Stopped Apologizing for Looking Like Ourselves?’ in Lockdown Instagram Film Produced by PrettyBird UK  

PRETTYBIRD UK have produced an Instagram film for new client Billie Razors, which perfectly captures how body image anxiety associated with social media has increased with lockdown video calls. 

As Coronavirus swept over the planet like a Tsunami, people retreated into their homes and became even more glued to their screens, replacing physical interaction with zoom chats and house party calls. For a generation of Millennials surrounded by images of perfect celebrities and influencers on social media, these filtered versions of idealised faces and bodies only serve to exacerbate the anxiety of young people who are often already suffering from body dysmorphic disorder. So a new film for clean beauty brand Billie showing girls, women and non-binary of different generations laughing about their less than perfect hair, skin or makeup, the refreshing film, encourages us all to stop apologising for simply being ourselves.

PRETTYBIRD UK were asked to make the Billie film during the Covid-19 lockdown, and against the odds worked around the restrictions placed on filming during quarantine, remotely producing an Instagram film for the brand. The film has already had close to 80,000 views, and captures with authenticity the way quarantine has forced us to look at our own self-image with the lockdown video chats.

Billie co-founder Georgina Gooley came up with the idea for the campaign after noticing that every Zoom work from home meeting began with people apologising for the way they looked. Part of that comes from being “face-to-face with your own face, so much more often than you would be if you were just working in a normal office,” she said.

The shoots for this campaign were done over Zoom, featuring people filming from their homes in the USA, UK, Israel, Spain and Russia. To try to capture a more natural interaction between people, the participants were asked to recruit their friends to join the calls, giving the campaign an authenticity that wouldn’t be achieved using actors.

Billie are a revolutionary new clean beauty brand making a name for themselves for redefining the conventional definition of beauty, and breaking out of the tired stereotypes of some more traditional beauty product advertising. After noticing that women were overpaying for razors and being shamed for having body hair, they removed the ‘Pink Tax’ and showed body hair removal on screen. Billie’s main demographic is comprised of women and non-binary in the 18–35 age range.

PRETTYBIRD UK Head of New Business Mia Powell said: “We’re so thrilled to be working with Billie who are becoming one of the key players in the sustainable beauty industry. It’s been great to work with a brand who are succeeding in moving the conversation forward and reshaping beauty ideals. We are looking forward to collaborating with them on more campaigns that reflect their ethos of rethinking the way we define and visualise beauty in the future.”

Link to the film: https://www.instagram.com/p/CAFoqK1jSGw/ 

Billie say: “A lot of time spent on Zoom  = a lot of looking at ourselves = a lot of knee jerk apologies for how we look. Sorry for my bags! my roots! my grays! You name it, we’ve apologized for it. But when we say sorry for that stuff, aren’t we really just apologizing for looking like… ourselves?”