Whilst in the past sexism has been more overt, in recent years we could still see a need to improve the representation of women on-screen.

Maltesers has always portrayed women in a progressive way, rejecting gender stereotypes like the housewife, the shopaholic, or the generic “office worker”.

In this vein, there are few groups of women to be more stereotyped than disabled women, who face double prejudice. The Paralympic Games gave us the perfect opportunity to represent this group at a time we can truly shift cultural pewrceptions.

Through our “looking on the light side” TV construct, we could see a role for Maltesers to better represent disabled women by shining a light on their everyday lives – not just showing the extraordinary achievements of those who have achieved great things

Under our new campaign platform, Look on the Light Side, Maltesers makes light of everyday mishaps that affect each and every one of us, regardless of who we are or our position in society. Launching in conjunction with the 2016 Paralympics, this campaign focused specifically on disability. In these films we see three different groups of women catching up over a bag of Maltesers, laughing together about a recent blunder relating to the protagonist’s disability. In ‘New Boyfriend’ our protagonist with cerebral palsy explains how an intimate moment with her boyfriend quickly got a lot more intimate after she experienced a spasm.

The 2016 Maltesers campaign caused a shift in the communications industry by shaking up the traditional portrayal of disabled people. Where previous communications have typically marginalised those with disabilities as objects of pity or of admiration, Maltesers showed that they can be silly, hilarious and authentic people who laugh at the daily ups and downs of life.

The suite of all three films initially ran across UK TV channels and on-demand services for two months, and are still airing in rotation to date – by April 2017, the ads have reached over 80% of the UK population, collectively aired over 47,810 spots