Always #LikeAGirl: how a Super Bowl ad turned a phrase into a movement
In June 2014, Always (Procter & Gamble’s feminine-care brand) released a YouTube ad called “Always #LikeAGirl,” produced by Leo Burnett. The film asked adults and young children to demonstrate what “running like a girl” meant. The adults mimed the cliche; the young girls just ran. The ad reframed an insult into a question. Always aired a 60-second version during Super Bowl XLIX on February 1, 2015. The campaign won Cannes Lions Grand Prix and reshaped how brands talk about gender.
- Story: In June 2014, Always (P&G) released a YouTube ad called “Always #LikeAGirl,” directed by documentary filmmaker Lauren Greenfield. The film asked adults and young children to demonstrate what “running like a girl” meant. The adults mimed weakness; the young girls just ran. The film accumulated 50M+ views in its first three months and aired during Super Bowl XLIX on February 1, 2015. The campaign won Cannes Lions Grand Prix and reshaped how brands talk about gender.
- Why it matters: Most purpose campaigns fail because the brand hasn't earned the position and the audience can tell. #LikeAGirl worked because Always had decades of relationship with the puberty-and-confidence moment, the format showed rather than told, and the campaign was followed by sustained operational programs.
- Takeaway: Show, don't tell. The campaign demonstrated the point without explaining it — the documentary quality is what made it land.
- Takeaway: The brand has to have earned the position. Brands without the historical relationship can't copy the format without reading as opportunistic.
- Takeaway: Single campaigns don't produce durable brand equity. Always followed up with sustained programs (puberty education, UN partnerships); brands that ran one campaign and quit didn't see the same compound effect.
Always #LikeAGirl — the four-step story
Always #LikeAGirl at a glance
Quick facts
Where Always was in 2013
Always had been Procter & Gamble’s leading feminine-hygiene brand for decades. The category was structurally tough for brand differentiation: the products are functional, the purchase is recurring, and category advertising had historically been clinical or coy (the blue-liquid demonstrations, the discreet packaging, the avoidance of saying what the product actually does). Most Always advertising over the years had been product-feature-focused and demographic-targeted at women in their teens to thirties.
P&G and Leo Burnett saw an opportunity to do something different. The brand had decades of relationship with girls and women through the puberty-and-confidence moment. The team developed a thesis that Always could earn brand-equity by addressing the broader confidence crisis girls face around puberty — not by selling more pads, but by being the brand that acknowledged the moment. The challenge was finding an execution that would land culturally without reading as a brand trying too hard.
The campaign
Lauren Greenfield, a documentary photographer known for work on body image and gender, directed the film. The structure was simple: bring adults and young children into a studio, ask each one to demonstrate “running like a girl” (and “throwing like a girl,” “fighting like a girl”). The adults — including women — mimed the cliche: weak, flapping, ineffective. The young girls, when asked, just ran. Just threw. Just fought.
The film made the point without narration. The adults had absorbed the “like a girl” cliche so completely that they performed weakness when asked to do the activity “like a girl.” The young girls hadn't learned the cliche yet, so they just did the activity. The implicit question: when did “like a girl” become an insult, and to whom?
A few choices made the campaign land culturally:
- YouTube launch before Super Bowl. The full-length film went up on YouTube in June 2014, eight months before the Super Bowl. The film accumulated 50M+ views and significant cultural discussion before P&G ever paid for broadcast.
- Super Bowl as amplification, not launch. The 60-second Super Bowl spot on February 1, 2015 wasn't the campaign’s introduction — it was the moment the campaign crossed from social-media phenomenon into mass-broadcast cultural moment. The Super Bowl audience was already partly aware of the film when it aired.
- Real children, no acting. The young girls in the film weren't acting. The casting and direction were structured to capture genuine reactions, which is part of why the film felt documentary rather than commercial.
- Hashtag built into the campaign. #LikeAGirl was promoted alongside the film as a way for viewers to participate. The hashtag accumulated millions of uses on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook over the campaign window.
What grew, and what came with it
The YouTube film accumulated 50M+ views in its first three months. After the Super Bowl airing, total views passed 100M and continued growing for years. The #LikeAGirl hashtag accumulated millions of uses across platforms. Always brand-equity metrics around purpose, consideration, and emotional connection improved meaningfully after the campaign. Cannes Lions awarded the campaign Grand Prix for Public Relations in 2015. An Emmy for Outstanding Commercial followed.
The cultural impact was the most visible outcome. “Like a girl” as a phrase didn't disappear, but the campaign meaningfully shifted public discourse about what the phrase means and whose insult it is. Always followed up with subsequent films in the same series (#KeepGoing, the puberty-education work, partnerships with the United Nations on girls’ education) that extended the brand position into a sustained program rather than a single campaign moment.
What other brands tried to copy
A wave of brand purpose campaigns followed in 2015-2018 trying to recreate the cultural impact of #LikeAGirl. Some worked at smaller scale (Dove Real Beauty extensions, certain Procter & Gamble follow-ups). Many didn't produce comparable cultural resonance. The patterns of failure are consistent:
- The brand hadn’t earned the position. #LikeAGirl worked partly because Always had decades of relationship with the puberty moment. Brands that took purpose positions on topics they had no historical connection to read as opportunistic.
- Show, don't tell. The campaign worked because the format demonstrated the point without explaining it. Brands that explained their purpose position rather than showing it lost the “documentary” quality that made #LikeAGirl resonate.
- Real subjects, not actors. The campaign used actual children responding genuinely. Brands that recreated the format with paid actors produced content that felt staged and didn’t carry the same emotional weight.
- Single campaign, no follow-through. Many brands launched a single purpose campaign in 2015-2017 and then went back to standard product marketing. Always followed up with sustained programs that extended the position. The single-campaign approach didn't produce durable brand-equity gains.
How RGM thinks about purpose campaigns at scale
When clients ask about running purpose campaigns, the #LikeAGirl case is useful as both an example and a reality check. The example is that when the conditions are right (the brand has earned the position, the format shows rather than tells, the campaign is followed by sustained operational programs), purpose campaigns can produce cultural moments that compound brand equity for years. The reality check is that the conditions are rarely all met, and purpose campaigns done badly damage the brand they were meant to help.
The honest framework: the right test for a purpose campaign is whether the brand would be willing to maintain the position for the next decade across leadership changes, regulatory shifts, and quarterly pressure. If yes, the campaign can run. If no, the campaign should not run. Always has stayed in the “girls’ confidence” position for years past the original campaign because P&G genuinely committed to it. Most brands aren't willing to make that commitment, and the honest move for those brands is to choose a different marketing strategy entirely.
Frequently asked questions
Did the Super Bowl ad really only run once?
The 60-second Super Bowl spot aired during Super Bowl XLIX on February 1, 2015. The longer YouTube film had been online since June 2014 and continued to be promoted across multiple channels for years after. The Super Bowl airing was a major amplification moment, but the campaign existed before, during, and after the Super Bowl as a sustained content program rather than a single broadcast event.
Who is Lauren Greenfield?
A documentary photographer and filmmaker known for work on body image, gender, and youth culture (including the documentary “Thin” about eating disorders and “Generation Wealth” about the psychology of money). Her documentary background was a deliberate choice for the campaign — the film needed to feel observational rather than commercial, and Greenfield’s approach brought that quality.
Did Always brand sales actually grow because of the campaign?
P&G has publicly described the campaign as commercially successful. Specific sales attribution is difficult to isolate from broader category dynamics, distribution shifts, and other marketing investment. The clearer measurable outcomes are brand-equity metrics (purpose, consideration, emotional connection) that improved meaningfully after the campaign and cultural metrics (hashtag usage, views, earned-media coverage) that were unambiguous.
How long did Always continue the campaign?
The #LikeAGirl theme became a sustained program rather than a single campaign moment. P&G and Leo Burnett continued releasing films and programs in the same series (#KeepGoing, partnerships with the United Nations on girls’ education, puberty-education initiatives) for years after the original campaign. The position has continued to anchor Always brand work across leadership transitions.
Did the campaign face criticism?
Some, mostly from critics who argued that any purpose marketing from a CPG brand is fundamentally about selling products rather than addressing the underlying issue. The criticism has merit but the campaign earned credibility through operational follow-through (the Self-Esteem programs, the puberty-education work) that distinguished it from one-off purpose-marketing attempts. Most retrospective analyses treat the campaign as a credible example of purpose marketing rather than a cynical one.
Sources & references
- Always #LikeAGirl (YouTube) — The original full-length film.
- Leo Burnett — Always #LikeAGirl case — Agency case study.
- Cannes Lions 2015 — #LikeAGirl winner page — Industry-award recognition.
- Lauren Greenfield (director) — Director background and other work.