Marks & Spencer, a global fashion brand and lingerie expert, has an ongoing goal to prevent 9,000 breast cancer cases a year by 2025. To achieve the goal, the brand has been working tirelessly for years. UK’s lingerie leader has been introducing initiatives to raise awareness around breast cancer, providing solutions to help the cause and also, supporting breast cancer survivors, globally.

In India, since 2016, Marks & Spencer has been collaborating with Tata Memorial Hospital to work towards breast cancer prevention in India. This year, the focus was to encourage women to adopt the habit of self-diagnosis.

But in India, 75% of women shy away from checking themselves, which often results in late detection leading to lesser chances of survival. So, Marks & Spencer was looking for a way to talk to Indian women about self-diagnosis in a personal manner and empower them to take the required action.

On International Women’s Day 2021, women who walked into the Marks & Spencer stores were presented with a life-saving gift called Straps That Remind. These are a unique pair of transparent bra straps, designed to remind women to check themselves for early signs of breast cancer when they are in their personal space. These life-saving straps come imprinted with a message of self-diagnosis, which disappears when the straps are worn and re-appears when they are taken off. It was achieved by creating a customised thermochromic ink that responds to body heat and makes the message disappear. Developed in collaboration with Tata Memorial Hospital, Straps That Remind come enclosed in a detailed leaflet that showcases steps of self-examination and provides information about medical support should women suspect anything unusual. Hence, transforming an everyday product into a health reminder.

To understand behaviour of different women towards breast cancer and early detection, Marks & Spencer contacted its female customers. All these women reside in Tier-1 and Tier-2 cities of India, belong to higher socio-economic status, are well aware of their bodies, and are health conscious too.

The brand got in touch with such 90+ women, who were all aware of the need for regular self-examination, but unfortunately, only 2 of them had actually self-diagnosed themselves.

Hence, it was imperative to remind women to self-diagnose themselves and make them consider it as a part of self-care. To achieve the same, a two-pronged approach was followed. As the first step, women were introduced to the life-saving Straps That Remind while addressing the rising health crisis in India. In the second phase, the brand made these straps available to its customers to trigger action and save lives.

The process of introducing women to Straps That Remind began a few weeks before International Women’s Day 2021. Marks & Spencer launched a video across its digital platforms, highlighting the health hazard of breast cancer and the role of Straps That Remind in cultivating the habit of self-examination. Many influencer partners and indie TV actors were gifted these personal reminders and seen wearing them in their videos. The brand also gifted these straps to women working at Marks & Spencer and various other organisations.

On 8th March 2021, the brand brought these straps to their stores. The women customers of the brand were contacted beforehand through emailers, social media platforms, and WhatsApp and invited to the store to get these life-saving reminders for themselves. Moreover, the men who visited were also introduced to the straps and they took home these personal reminders for women that they care about.