
The light-hearted, romantic style of earlier Cadbury’s chocolates advertisements stands in marked contrast to the sexy and seductive tone adopted here.
This advertisement from the late 1960s or early 1970s shows a woman eating assorted Cadbury’s Roses chocolates. As she bites into the different flavours, she transforms into different types of women – 'crisp, elegant, sophisticated’, 'fresh and young’ and 'exotic’. The male voice-over finishes by saying 'so many different flavours to match every different mood a woman can have’. Summary by Poppy De Souza.
This advertisement uses a husky male voice-over, lush instrumental backing, a beautiful woman and close-ups of eyes, lips and fingers to align Roses chocolates with sensuality, sexiness and seduction. Unlike other Roses advertisements, this ad does not focus on a male-female relationship but appeals directly to women and their desire to pamper themselves once in a while.
The Cadbury’s Roses line of boxed assorted chocolates was introduced in the 1930s to compete with the market of 'twist wrap’ assortments. While the box design has changed over the years (compare Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate – 'Give Her Roses’, 1959, and Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate – 'You’ve Got Yourself a Man’, c1970) and the flavours have diversified, the Roses 'twist wrap’ chocolates remain as distinctive as ever.
Comparing the different Roses commercials provides a good overview of how the marketing of a product changes and is informed by the social customs and fashions of the era. For instance, the light-hearted, romantic style of Give Her Roses stands in marked contrast to the sexy and seductive tone adopted in this advertisement.
Notes by Poppy De Souza
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.