L’Oréal redefines male strength with mental health campaign

L’Oréal Men Expert has launched a new campaign to "redefine what it means to be a strong man in 2023", hoping to demonstrate that strength comes in all forms.

The campaign is supported by new research from L’Oréal, conducted with 2,015 UK males between 30 October and 2 November 2023, to explore how the modern man defines strength.

When asked ‘what does being strong mean to you?’ the most popular responses were ‘supporting friends and family when they need lifting up’ and dealing with challenges and bouncing back from them’.

While this may be perceived as positive, only 14% of men regard being vulnerable with friends and family, as being ‘strong’, compared to 28% who feel it’s about handling other people’s problems.

The data revealed that nearly a third (32%) of men find it easier to listen to a friend's personal issues than talk about their own, with 24% finding it difficult to open up to friends about how they are feeling. It also found that 14% of men say they have nobody to turn to with their struggles.

When asked about the biggest sign of strength in other men, 15% selected ‘how much they can lift in the gym’ or ‘how many iron mans they have completed’ over ‘opening up about feelings’. In addition, over 1 in 10 men (11%) view ‘burying emotions’ as what being strong means to them.

To address this, L’Oréal Men Expert has partnered with Movember and the World’s Strongest Man (WSM) competition to help create a culture where every man feels strong enough to open-up.

The campaign spotlights three "strong" men in the public eye, each with their own unique stories of mental health struggles and the strength they found in opening up.

As part of this, Jake Daniels (the UK's first openly gay footballer), Jordan Stephens (the musician known for Rizzle Kicks), and Tom Stoltman (the WSM champion for 2021 and 2022 ) appear across social media, television, radio, and outdoor advertising to encourage men to seek help if they are suffering from mental health issues.

To "cement the legacy" of the campaign, L’Oréal, Movember and World’s Strongest Man have also crafted a new symbol of strength to be remembered after Movember finishes at the end of the month.

This takes inspiration from the original WSM trophy – a symbol of physical strength, one man carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders - to create a new icon of emotional strength, featuring three men supporting the heavy weight together in a moment of solidarity.

Jennie Flatt, Brand Leader at L'Oréal Men Expert, said: “In our sixth year of partnership with Movember, we are excited to collaborate with the World's Strongest Man competition to challenge the taboo that continues to exist around male vulnerability.

"It aims to shine a very well-deserved light on the stories of men who demonstrate that strength comes in all forms. Opening up the conversation of how vulnerability is not a sign of weakness but a strength to be celebrated is something we feel very passionately about as a brand.”