Sunnie, the brand new model from Reese Witherspoon’s Whats up Sunshine, was born out of a want to empower Gen Z ladies.
Sunnie is a multi-platform, Gen Z-focused model that exists on social media, in actual life, and thru community-driven content material. It plans to put up on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and Pinterest. The model will even host occasions, launch digital zines, and supply customized curriculum for teen ladies and their caretakers masking matters from monetary literacy to certificates applications. It’s an extension of Whats up Sunshine’s unique mission to place girls on the heart of each story.
“It’s designed to really feel like a motion—joyful, collaborative, and deliberately completely different from the always-on, hyper-curated norms of conventional media,” Jennifer Wiener, the EVP of Photo voltaic, Whats up Sunshine’s in-house company, informed ADWEEK.
Whats up Sunshine noticed a necessity and a white house for constructing an area for Gen Z ladies. Along with an absence of media aimed toward Gen Z, Sunnie additionally hopes to assist younger girls who don’t really feel represented by manufacturers or the media.
“Over the previous few years, one of many quickest rising viewers alternatives has been this youth viewers,” stated Wiener.
Sunnie partly responds to a void of media and types directed at teen ladies in recent times. Within the Nineteen Nineties and aughts there have been dozens of teenybopper magazines addressing each facet of teenybopper life, however that period resulted in 2018 when the ultimate two, Seventeen and Rookie Magazine, went out of print.
As we speak, teen ladies interact with tradition and advertisers on social media, which could be a harmful place for them. Sunnie is partly a response to an ask from Whats up Sunshine’s neighborhood of moms on the lookout for help and a greater surroundings to boost their daughters in.
“We’re deliberately creating experiences that carry ladies outdoors of the digital ecosystem and into environments that create gradual areas for them to discover, lean in, and deepen their engagement,” stated Wiener.
Sunnie needs to work with manufacturers
E.l.f. Cosmetics is Whats up Sunshine’s anchor accomplice for Sunnie. Final 12 months, the sweetness model labored with Whats up Sunshine to host Reese’s Guide Membership inside E.l.f.’s Roblox surroundings with Witherspoon’s nieces, Abby James and Draper. The Whats up Sunshine expertise was E.l.f.’s greatest performing model marketing campaign on Roblox, stated Kory Marchisotto, CMO of E.l.f. Cosmetics. The wonder model additionally prolonged the marketing campaign with Abby James and Draper to Twitch with greater than 175,000 individuals tuning in.
“These indicators are telling us that connecting these two worlds is extremely highly effective, and persons are very on this intersection of magnificence, tradition, and leisure,” stated Marchisotto.
Marchisotto informed ADWEEK {that a} research Whats up Sunshine ran formed the model’s involvement with Sunnie. Seventy-six % of Gen Z ladies between the ages of 13 and 18 years previous don’t really feel seen in right this moment’s media, Marchisotto stated.
Along with E.l.f. Cosmetics, Sunnie has partnered with organizations like Être, Step Up, AnitaB.org, Girls’s Sports activities Basis and the Baby Thoughts Institute, in addition to Purdue College.
With girls clothes model Être, Sunnie has fashioned the Sunnie Gen Z Advisory Board. The board consists of 20 various teenage ladies from throughout the nation that vary in age from 13 to 21. The board doubles as a mentorship program and ladies had been chosen based mostly on their realness, curiosity, and willingness to talk actually about what it means to develop up proper now. Sunnie asks the board open questions and checks concepts, co-creates content material, programming, and messaging with them.
Sunnie needs to carry girls into STEM
Purdue is partnering with Sunnie to develop curriculum to encourage ladies to pursue careers in STEM. Whereas the programming remains to be in growth, Kelly Hiller, Purdue’s CMO informed ADWEEK that Purdue is fascinated with launching a STEM workbook that makes completely different profession paths accessible to teen ladies by exhibiting how their pursuits may match up with STEM careers.
Purdue will even present profession growth choices to Sunnie’s audience’s of caregivers. Finally, Sunnie will embrace a touchdown web page of certificates applications and STEM growth aimed toward caregivers. These certificates may embrace something from Google Profession certificates in matters like venture administration and information analytics to pharmacy technician certificates.
The partnership between Sunnie and Purdue aligns with Purdue’s goal of bridging the gender hole in STEM, and it permits the college to achieve its core-intended viewers of potential candidates, 13 to 17-year-olds. In partnership with Sunnie, Purdue will host extra hands-on occasions to encourage curiosity in STEM careers.
Sunnie reached out to Purdue after the college partnered with E.l.f. for an activation final 12 months to spark ladies’ curiosity in STEM tied to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour exhibits in Indianapolis. The “STEM Period” occasion was open to the general public and featured actions like making friendship bracelets utilizing binary code and designing social media backgrounds utilizing laptop graphics expertise. It drew 10,000 attendees.
“We’re going to work with Sunnie to assist develop their STEM curriculum for younger girls, in addition to making programs {and professional} growth alternatives accessible to their caregivers,” Kelly Hiller, Purdue’s CMO informed ADWEEK.
