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New Kotex Effort Dangles Undie 'Makeunder'

KotexMakeunde

Kimberly-Clark's Kotex brand is launching a new chapter in its effort to get women to ditch their aged undergarments. The program, "Project Makeunder," is a consumer content effort in which women are encouraged to talk about the contents of their underwear and bra drawers.

The effort also involves TV personality Kathy Griffin and celebrity stylist George Kotsiopoulos, who will do undergarment makeovers for the winners among women who submit their lingerie stories. The participants are winnowed by consumer voting through Sept. 12. The winners' makeovers will be documented in a five webisodes that will be co-written by Kathy Griffin.

The campaign is centered at KotexProjectMakeunder.com. Ten semifinalists will be chosen to submit a second round of videos on how their lingerie drawers are in need of revamping. Three grand prize winners will win the makeovers.

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Aida Flick, brand director at Kotex, tells Marketing Daily the effort is a continuation of a program that started last fall with the "Panty Challenge" campaign, a promotion that encouraged women to try Kotex with a promise that any problems meant new undergarments on K-C's dime.

She says that program promoted Kotex by getting women to get rid of those undergarments they wore only while menstruating with the underlying idea that Kotex provides leakage protection. "The notion was to let go of the 'period panty' idea. It reinforces that we believe in the performance of our product. We knew the insight was spot on. So now the idea is, let's not limit ourselves to just thinking about period days.

"We got some very strong responses to that and realized we were onto a core insight, and this was an opportunity to take that idea to the next level," says Flick.

Kotex this year launched a younger-skewing "U By Kotex" featuring the Kardashian sisters talking about menstruation. "While there are two different consumer targets for mainline versus 'U by K,' our initiative -- regardless of whether the target is a 20- or 30-year-old or older -- the point is to make sure we speaking in an honest way, not stereotyping based on old taboos and myths."

Flick says the Kotex effort, which targets women in their 30s and 40s, is by Mindshare. "They came up with this approach that leverages well-known names. We had great success with them before and they understand our brand and initiatives," she says.

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