Companies selling sexual health products and medications on the Internet are changing their marketing strategies to highlight the availability of mail-order emergency contraception, commonly known as morning-after pills.
Some are also using their emergency birth control ad to protest the government’s moves against reproductive rights, including the Supreme Court’s scrapping of the constitutional right to abortion. Reversed Roe vs. Wade.
Hay Favour Inc., a direct-to-consumer provider of birth control, including emergency contraception, pregnancy tests and skin care products, has recently directed most of its marketing budget into advocacy campaigns promoting abortion rights. Its latest out-of-home ads, which ran two weeks in anticipation of the High Court’s ruling, argue that the end of the federal constitutional right to abortion reflects future limits on contraception.
“They’re coming for your abortion,” says an ad from the company, which does business as favors. “Your birth control is next.”
This is Favre’s first campaign since being rebranded from Pill Club in May. While the company advertised its emergency contraception under that guise, its marketing focused more on advertisements for contraceptive prescriptions.
Unlike pills that are taken to induce abortion in the early stages of pregnancy, morning-after pills temporarily stop the ovaries from releasing an egg in the days following unprotected sex, thereby preventing fertilization. They are legal in every state.
New, more-political campaigns advertising direct-to-consumer emergency contraception are underway as companies including
CVS Health Corporation
And
walmart Inc.
start rationing pills Amidst a surge in demand. Some online providers are encouraging customers to stock up for later emergencies.
Favre is allowing customers to purchase up to 10 courses of emergency contraception per order and to reorder additional without limit.
“Given the time of [Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization] Governance, which we expected soon followed our rebrand, we felt strongly that our first ad campaign out of the gate should educate patients, women and menstruating people about what was at stake, how to get care , and how to prepare for post-Row World, without prejudice,” said Lauren Scrimma, Head of Brand Marketing at Favre.
Women-focused healthcare brands such as Get Stix Inc., which does business as Sticks, and Noorx, which merged with healthcare company Thirty Madison Inc. in February, have funneled their marketing budgets into campaigns that Designed to explain how emergency birth control works, spotlight its online availability and dispel misconceptions that it is a form of early abortion.
Co-founder and co-chief executive Jamie Norwood said Stix, which also sells pregnancy tests, supplements and medication for reproductive health, has decided to advertise its own morning-after pill, Restart, released June 21. Re-allocated your digital marketing budget.
The company launched its first out-of-home campaign last week, posting ads for the restart, along with fertility-rights messages, on billboards within 5 miles of crisis pregnancy centers in the states that Roe v. Abortion was banned in order to overturn Wade. through the so-called trigger laws, The purpose of such centers is often to deter visitors from having abortions.
Past Stix campaigns did not touch on abortion rights, Ms Norwood said. “We focused more on the value propositions of our individual products and left politics out,” she said.
Stix also hired PR agency Jennifer Bett Communications to spread the word about the restart, as well as the ability for customers to stock up on the morning-after pill due to its shelf life of up to 20 months, especially those in 13 states. where there were trigger laws. in place, Ms Norwood said.
The company processed 10 times more orders after Restart on Monday than last Friday, Ms Norwood said. She said more than 72% of purchases made on Monday involved more than one dose. The company is not limiting the number of pills a customer can order.
Nurx, which provides skin care and treatments for depression as well as birth control, saw requests for emergency contraception quadruple after The draft of the Roe v. Wade ruling was leaked In May, according to Kelly Gardiner, vice president of communications at ParentsThirtyMadison.
“We expect to see even higher numbers now that the Supreme Court has officially made its ruling and that people make long-term plans to support their healthcare decisions,” Ms Gardiner said. He added that the company is limiting customers to five tablets per order to manage demand and ensure equitable access.
Nurks has shifted its marketing plan to focus on education around emergency contraception, publishing guides for how it works, and creating a flowchart to help customers understand what they need. When and what it needs to take, and investing in paid search and social-media advertising to target those people. With questions about unprotected sex and pregnancy.
Roe v. Before the Wade leak, the company marketed all of its products and services equally, including at-home testing kits and the HIV-prevention pill, known as PrEP, Ms Gardiner said.
Ms Gardiner said the company has reduced the price of its morning after pill, called New Day, from $20 to $14.99.
“We really wanted to make it more affordable for people who need to stock up,” she said.
write to Katie Deaton katie.dighton@wsj.com
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