In Brazil, the law guarantees 120 days of work leave for mothers and only 5 days for fathers. Both laws were created in 1988 and have remained unchanged since then. This discrepancy is so normalized in Brazilian society that the journalistic media (newspapers, radio, TV news, and portals) companies and society in general simply did not talk about the topic. However, O Boticário is one of the few companies that offers a 120-day leave for fathers - matching the amount of time allocated to mothers. With the aim of extending this benefit to as many fathers as possible, the brand seized Father's Day to initiate a debate on extended paternity leave in the country.

Despite the Brazilian laws, O Boticário, Brazil’s top beauty brand, guarantees the same 120 days of parental leave for mothers and fathers alike. So, on Father’s Day, the brand decided to sell a cause rather than products. We launched a campaign with the aim of sparking a debate in society about the importance of paternal presence in the first days of a newborn child. The campaign was launched with a film featuring a father spending his first 5 days with his baby. When it comes to the 6th day, it abruptly cuts to the father working at an office. At the end, a lettering that reads “Let’s talk about parental leaving?” invited people to debate the subject. The brand was beyond the speech giving lectures about the issue, creating a supply to help other companies, CEOs, and HR departments adopt extended parental leave and opening its channels to answer questions.

After defining the campaign's key message, we went after channels and niches potentially interested in the topic of extended paternity leave. From TV programs to journalists, influencers, and organizations advocating for fathers' rights. We also leverage the media's tendency to cover topics aligned with celebratory dates (Father's Day, in this case) to ensure broader coverage than on regular occasions. It was also part of the strategy to plan events such as lectures given by O Boticário's leaders to invite individuals and groups interested in the cause of extended paternity leave.

The creative execution featured a film showing a father spending his first 5 days with his baby. On the 6th day, it abruptly cuts to the father working at an office. At the end, the text appears reading, “For how long will we think 5 days is enough?” Following this, another caption appears saying, “Let’s talk about parental leave,” inviting people to discuss the subject. The second step was to provide a guide to help HR departments, entrepreneurs, and companies adopt extended parental leave. After all, we complement this campaign through posts, lectures by O Boticário employees, open company channels for questions, and monitoring the repercussions of the topic on social media to amplify the conversation.

After the campaign aired, 6 bills proposing extended paternity leave passed in Congress and are under review. It was the most widely discussed Father's Day campaign in Brazil, gathering media attention and even being shown by a group of work in the National Congress in Brasília. The campaign also had high levels of engagement on social media, being shared even by international brands such as Mastercard, Volvo, and Amazon, in addition to major Brazilian companies like the financial sector startup Nubank. In addition to brands, we saw NGOs and institutions (4Daddy, Filhos no Currículo, Instituto Promundo, Maternidade nas Empresas e Escola de Super Pais por Marcos Piangers) that advocate for extending parental leave in Brazil sharing the campaign on social media.

O Boticário became the beauty brand most associated with supporting gender equality. Impressions: 516 million | Reach: 96 million | Online channels visits: 1.8 million.