Global consumer giant Unilever said on Thursday it would rebrand its skin-lightening cream ‘Fair & Lovely’ to ‘Glow & Lovely,’ after facing backlash that the name promoted negative stereotypes towards darker skin tones.
The move comes a week after the maker of Lipton Tea and Dove soap announced that it would drop words such as “fair,” “fairness,” “white,”, “whitening” from its marketing in a push to move away from a single ideal of beauty.
Its skin cream for men will be called ‘Glow & Handsome’, Hindustan Unilever said, and the products with the new brand name will appear on shelves over the next few months.
Skin-whitening creams have a huge market in South Asia, but the way their makers promote the products have come under question, at a time of worldwide focus on racial injustice following weeks of protests sparked by the May death of George Floyd, a Black man, in police custody in the United States.
HUL’s move last week to drop the word “fair” from its “Fair & Lovely” products was considered significant, as it came after years of calls to drop the branding or stop selling the creams, which dominate the skin-lightening cream market in India and have been endorsed by Bollywood celebrities, as well as other youth icons.
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