P&G brings out the babies in ‘Lead with love’ campaign

Procter & Gamble has launched a campaign for its corporate brand as it unveils a pledge to do 2,021 “acts of good” in the next year.

The “Lead with love” campaign kicks off with a new 60-second film, called Emotions, created by Dentsumcgarrybowen, which features images of babies and toddlers experiencing what it says are the eight emotions humans are born with – the most powerful of which, it claims, is love.

It was written by David Black, art directed by Jessica Terlizzi, and produced by the agency using stock and user-generated footage. The soundtrack is a version of the Cranberries song Dreams.

It will be shown online on Saturday 19 December during the pre-show for the Global Citizen Prize, an awards ceremony that “celebrates the leaders among us who are taking action to create a world we want and to uplift the world’s most vulnerable people”.

P&G is one of three campaign partners of the awards, along with Cisco and Citi. The awards will be shown in the UK on Sky One on Monday 21 December.

“Lead with love” will involve P&G, the owner of Gillette, Fairy and Ariel, committing to a series of actions related to social, cultural and environmental issues. It will start with donating tens of millions of dollars' worth of health, hygiene and cleaning products, PPE and financial support to help the people most affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

P&G’s pledge of 2,021 acts of good over the course of the year is equivalent to just over 5.5 a day. It has not said exactly how individual “acts” will be counted.

Over the next year P&G will continue programmes linked to some of its top brands, such as Pampers providing specially made nappies for the smallest premature babies, and the Puberty & Confidence Education programme from Always, which reaches more than 18 million children, parents and teachers each year.

In the UK, the business will continue its partnership with In Kind Direct, through which it has donated £1.2m-worth of products this year to those in need, and participate in Business in the Community’s Race at Work Charter to continue to drive progress towards racial equality.

Marc Pritchard, P&G's chief brand officer, said: “2020 has brought clarity to what matters and to the role that businesses and brands must play in society.

"With advertising that reaches people worldwide, we are choosing to use our voice at P&G and the voices of our brands to spark conversations, open hearts and inspire people everywhere to take action and to lead with love.”