Successful Daddying *shock, horror*

 

I saw something exciting the other day. And when I say exciting, I mean I actually beamed, laughed and called my boyfriend from the kitchen to tell him all about it. It was a baby product advert. But hold up… what’s this strange thing I’m seeing? A Dad browsing nappies and play pens? Surely not!

 

I’ve always been an Aldi fan, for more reason than one. Good quality food for great prices. Great career opportunities as part and parcel of their grad scheme and beyond. Impressive salaries. And more recently, their pledge to go organic. And now… THIS. If you haven’t already seen the advert, you can watch below:

 

https://www.aldi.ie/en/about-aldi/tv-campaigns/tv-adverts/

 

My mind was blown. And not because the concept of Dad’s actually Fathering their off-spring is new to me. In fact, for the completely opposite reason. Because I’m sick of seeing any child related advert, whether that’s nappies, baby food or even toys being Dad-absent. And if Dad IS included somewhere in the advert, he’s in the background and Mum is ALWAYS present. ALWAYS. Present and in charge and viewed as the only carer that matters. Watching Dad successfully Fathering (because who knew that would be possible!?) without Mum was an awesome thing to see but how this is only just being broadcast in 2016?

 

As much as I loved the advert, sadly the revelation made me realise that I can’t for the life of me remember ever seeing a child-product-related advert with just Dad involved. When have I ever seen that advertised before? In the advertising world, I’ve seen Dad booking holidays (with his bread-winning money) and I’ve seen Dad in the pub having beers with his mates and betting on the football (with his bread-winning money), and I’ve seen Dad driving his brand new family car (with his bread-winning money) but I’ve never seen Dad Fathering without Mum. But why?? [If you remember any adverts that I might have forgotten, please feel free to comment at the bottom] But my point is this – if I can’t remember them, they’re way too few and far between.

 

I read this article earlier this year about the ‘dumb things people need to stop saying to fathers’ and it couldn’t be truer. I liked and shared the article at the time but these attitudes coupled with the fact that Dad and baby are pretty much non-existent in the advertising world is when you begin to realise how gender stereotypical we still are about men and their roles in both families and society:

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3436386/Blogger-Rosie-Devereux-writes-dumb-things-people-need-stop-saying-fathers.html

 

If anything, I think Aldi deserve much more recognition for their current TV advert and I’m wondering how many others have watched it and had the same reaction as me. Whether that’s sadness over it only just becoming a ‘thing’ in the UK in 2016 or happiness over the supermarket chain taking steps to overcome gender stereotypes without the ‘look what Dad did this time’ and ‘what happens when you leave Dad with the baby’ jokes. If we can’t over-come these barriers, how is Shared Parental Leave ever going to work? (one of the many reasons I understand, but very much a contributing factor).

 

Now all we need are same sex couples featured in baby adverts and it might just make my year complete…