The shots Guide to...2017's Best LGBT-Themed Ads

Call it brands finally embracing diversity, or call it brands finding hundreds of thousands of new people to sell shit to, but 2017 has really felt like a year where the LGBT community has been fully embraced in advertising campaigns. With Pride coming to shot's hometown of London this week, what better time to celebrate some of that great work?

Skittles: Give the Rainbow

Although this article will focus on 2017 work, the current trend for cause-aware, impactful LGBT advertising could be said to have begun at last year's Pride in London, where adam&eveDDB launched Give the Rainbow, a campaign that saw them giving out packets of black and white Skittles, saying for the day that the sweet brand had given their rainbow to the LGBT community.

Although this support from a brand was nothing new (the first gay-themed ad came from Ikea in 1994, and Absolut have been sponsoring Pride marches for decades), this stunt felt new, and gave other brands the confidence to take bigger politics stands for the LGBT community. Brands like...

Airbnb: Until We All Belong

Airbnb's has been a champion of LGBT rights since at least 2015, when the brand released a film that highlighted difficulties queer couples could have when travelling around the world. Then, they were named 'Best Place to Work for LGBT Equality' in 2016. They made their biggest political statement, however, this year, when they worked with Clemenger BBDO to launch Until We All Belong. Following yet another delay from the Australian government on a marriage equality vote, the company started giving away rings that people pledged to where until there was full marriage equality.

What made this campaign particularly impactful was that Airbnb were joined by Google and Qantas in the campaign, highlighting how the issue was more important than any one brand's message.

Vicks: Touch of Care

As more brands have become open to LGBT-themed advertising, a new debate of action vs. representation has started; is it enough to merely show LGBT individuals on screen, or does a brand also have to commit to some form of positive change for those individuals too?

Vicks' Touch of Care show how, sometimes, representation can be enough, particularly if that is representation of groups you never otherwise see on film. In the film, directed by Neeraj Ghaywan of SeeOn for Publicis Singapore, we meet a transgendered mother and the daughter she adopted and if raising against all hardships and lack of legal rights.

Selfridges: Home Truths

Similar in terms of representing people not usually seen of screen, but coming from the other side of the world, is this from Selfridges' resident filmmaker Kathryn Ferguson, which explores how queer youth have created family units for themselves away from the families that didn't accept them.

Lynx: Is It OK For Guys...

Representing LGBT people and helping LGBT causes are the most important things brands and agencies can do in this area, but brands can also help those questioning their sexuality. After all, how we use brands are a big part of building our identities, and they can play a big part in allowing us to come to terms with ourselves, be it by wearing new clothes or experimenting with grooming, make-up, or sex to name just three.

With this in mind, 72andSunny Amsterdam this year launched Is It OK For Guys, a campaign which took real Google searches men had made and aimed to set their minds at rest. Although the videos they have created take in everything from fashion to pet ownership, a few videos have addressed sexuality, particurly the above video which answers the question 'is it OK for guys to experiment with other guys?'

Equinox: The LGBTQA Alphabet

Representation, however, is more complex than that. With hundreds of millions of LGBT people in the world, you can never represent everyone's experience, and you know in our post-Pepsi, post-Dove world those people you've missed will have no probably telling you about it in no uncertain terms on the internet.

Perhaps the nearest will come to a fully representative ad is this from fitness brand Equinox and Wieden + Kennedy, which asks us to look beyond the L, G, B and T and onto 22 additional letters that encompass a wider look at queer life.

Mercedes-Benz: Painted with Love

No matter how many brands have good intentions, however, homophobia is still a very real issue in society. Brands are understandably more wary of tackling this fact, perhaps fearful of having their own LGBT equivalent of that Pepsi moment.

Mercedes-Benz's new online vid, however, feels like a beginning of brands trying to tackle homophobia. For Painted with Love, directed by Mark Bone of Revolver Films for BBDO Toronto, the brand reacts against homophobic vandalism by commissioning a queer mural artist to create a positive mural after speaking to LGBT individuals who share their stories of homophobia.

Magnum: The Ceremony

Despite all the considerations that good LGBT-focused work should consider, sometimes we just want a beautiful fairytale, and that is exactly what LOLA MullenLowe give us in their lesbian wedding spot for Magnum.