The story of the Andrex puppy goes back to 1972. The toilet paper brand, which is now owned by FCB London, was then run by J. Walter Thompson. FCB’s chief creative officer Ben Jaffé is delighted that it almost never happened. “They had an idea on the table where an angelic, blonde little girl would basically walk around the house wrapped in toilet paper,” he says. “And it was mainly to demonstrate the length of the toilet paper roll, but also its strength – two important characteristics of the product. But the ASA said you couldn’t do that because it would encourage wasteful behavior.”
This was just a day or two before the shoot. Everything was booked. Then the art director chimes in and says he has an incredibly cute Labrador puppy and the ad could basically have the same concept, but instead of a cute little girl, here’s a cute puppy. “It was a huge stroke of luck,” says Ben, “because I think the puppy has an ability to communicate with people that goes way beyond the little girl’s ability. It wasn’t male or female, didn’t have a particular creed, race or anything. And it’s something that could be repeated over time.”
“Dog advertising, and animal advertising in general, is a good way to overcome casting problems,” he adds, “because people often want to feel some kind of connection with the protagonist of the communication. But as humans, we also like to respond to people who look and feel like us. So while you might turn off all sorts of people if you use a human, we overcome that problem by using an animal because they can identify with it – assuming you’re not more of a cat person. It’s a pretty good tool.”
The fact that the puppy has been part of Andrex’s advertising for over 50 years is not just down to luck. It is also because strategists like Ben have recognized the value of the furry brand icon and put it to good use. This value is based on over 20,000 years of humankind’s obsession with dogs.
“The evolution of dogs has led them to be very effective communicators and to have a very special relationship with humans, but also to have the power to influence us through images alone,” says Ben. “But I think the power of the Andrex puppy, beyond the general cuteness of something soft and cuddly, is in its eyes.
“The way we interact with dogs is very specific. The domestication of wolves and dog breeding over thousands of years has caused dogs to develop muscles around their eyes that wolves don’t have. There’s a muscle called the LAOM (levator anguli oculi medialis) that basically works like an eyebrow muscle. Do you know that dogs often have small eyebrows and have the ability to raise their eyebrow to make their eye bigger? It has the effect of a schema, like a baby. It triggers a natural response in people. When you see a baby’s face and its big, wondrous eyes looking at you curiously, you want to take care of it. It triggers the natural instinct to take care of it. You can’t help but react. When you see a puppy, people want to bend down and cuddle it, don’t you?”
Ben further links this to further research he has done while working on the Andrex account, looking at Carl Jung’s theory of archetypes. “He talked about how we have a number of different archetypes within us that can be enlivened at certain times. So there can be a life experience that enlivens a particular archetype within you, and there can be people and things that enliven a particular archetype within you. For example, if you give a young child – who needs care and attention themselves – a puppy, it enlivens the instinct to care. The child will start to pet it, cuddle it, look after it, feed it and give it water, take it for walks and all these things.”
This effect, of course, continues into adulthood. That is, puppies can make us care. “Puppies have incredible power,” Ben continues. “They have the ability to connect with people, young and old, and trigger that archetype in us – the instinct to care. So for Andrex, that was an incredibly powerful brand argument. Semiotically, caring is baked into the brand. When you see Andrex, when you see the puppy, you have a desire to care – to care for yourself, to care for your family, to care for the people around you. And I think that’s been leveraged with varying degrees of success over the 52 years that the puppy has been around.”
“Our predecessors used the puppy as a kind of symbol of comfort and softness of the product, but we wanted to make it a symbol to make you actually care about it – to engage with this thing and start caring about something that really matters.” Get Comfortable is about changing the avoidance behaviour of Brits when going to the toilet, and in turn, improving the health and wellbeing of Brits. How soft the bottom feels is still part of it, but Andrex wants us to care about something much more fundamental.
“The puppy is now used as a trigger in the communication,” explains Ben. “It triggers an action and the realization that something needs to be done. So in the example in the office, she looks around furtively and a little shyly, and then when the puppy nods sweetly at her, she realizes that she needs to do something and just go to the bathroom. The same goes for each of the executions, there is a relationship between puppy, protagonist and even spectator.”
Of course, Andrex isn’t the only brand showcasing the cuteness of dogs this International Dog Day. Brands around the world are recognising the power of the human bond with their four-legged friends. Ben lists a number of brands that are doing this with enthusiasm, such as paint brand Dulux, whose mascot has an even older history than Andrex’s. FCB London is also working with car brand Škoda. “The team at Škoda UK and the work we’ve done has recognised that there is a huge market to become the car brand for dog owners. Many have also made efforts to target dog owners, but Škoda UK is actually a sponsor of (international dog show) Crufts and so has invested quite a lot in the dog community.”
As CSO working with Andrex, it’s also Ben’s job to know the competition inside out. And it fills him with pride to see so much cuteness. “In the toilet paper category alone, the success of Andrex’s formula has spawned many imitators,” he says. “There are brands with kittens, there are brown bears, koala bears, pandas, ducklings and other species of animals with big eyes and childlike looks that also happen to have soft, cute, cuddly down, fur or feathers.”
He makes a joking dig at a particular competitor: “Koala bears can transmit chlamydia, so it’s a funny choice for the brand symbol of Cushelle, a brand that operates in the intimate hygiene sector. I think koalas infecting people with chlamydia is a big problem in Australia.”
This International Dog Day is an opportunity for all of us to celebrate the unique relationship our species shares with the wolves we domesticated before the last Ice Age, whether we’re picking up their poop or buying toilet paper for our own. It’s also a reminder for FCB London to put Andrex’s iconic brand assets to good use as the team there works on the sequel to its Spring 2024 campaign. “We’ll start working on the sequel soon, but the pup will always be part of the makeup,” says Ben. “He’s an integral part of the brand and it would be madness to lose the pup.”
