On day one of the Star FLOW festival, Cindy Gallop, founder, MakeLoveNotPorn and Susan Credle, global CCO, FCB, discussed whether the female consumer is being governed by a male agenda. The session was moderated by Sangeeta Talwar, managing partner, Flyvision Consulting.
Speaking about the power of women, Gallop said, “Forty-eight per cent of the world’s population is comprised of women. Sixty-five per cent of the purchase decisions are made by women. There is a huge amount of money to be made by taking women seriously. Women buy. Women share. We are gossipers and sharers. We also share on social media. The future is female, but yet we live in a world that is set up for men.”
She labelled advertising as the most powerful tool to drive the aspirational culture the world is looking at.
Talwar then mentioned how while 30 per cent of the women are getting out and working, they are still restricted as they are ‘role bound’.
Credle spoke about how she decided she didn’t want to take that route at a young age. “I saw my mother getting divorced and being left with nothing other than two children to bring up. I didn’t want to follow that route,” said Credle before revealing that she has married and taken the surname of her husband, who is extremely supportive of her.
Gallop warned how tokenism is dangerous and useless. “Tokenism is useless. There was a board which had two women. One woman board member made a good point, and the male chairman thanked the other after the meeting, because they looked similar. We need boards to have a minimum of three women on them,” said Gallop.
