HEAD & SHOULDERS
8.6m
VIEWS
130K
LIKES
4K
shares
Championing positive male role models alongside a British icon.
Background
Head & Shoulders had strong brand awareness in the UK, but limited cultural relevance with a new target audience of young, digital native men. While the brand was familiar, it was not actively chosen or talked about by Gen Z males, who are increasingly disengaged from traditional advertising and sceptical of conventional brand messaging.
To build genuine affinity, Head & Shoulders needed to move beyond legacy media, expand their talent roster, and show up on the platforms where this audience actually spends time, with content that feels entertaining, native, and culturally current.
The challenge was how to take a legendary brand and an iconic spokesperson like Claudia Winkleman and make them resonate with a Gen Z male audience that values humour, irony, and cultural relevance.
Target Audience
The target audience marked a clear shift for the brand, with Head & Shoulders deliberately moving towards Gen Z males, a younger, digitally native audience with very different expectations of how brands should show up. This was not an extension of an existing strategy, but a fundamental change in approach, requiring new platforms, new creative formats, and new talent that felt credible to this generation.
Client Challenge
The core objective was to convince a new generation of Gen Z men, as well as the partners and parents who often influence their purchasing decisions, that Head & Shoulders is an essential part of a young man’s everyday grooming routine. To do this, the brand needed to leverage big digital names and plug into popular cultural worlds such as Love Island to instantly grab attention and signal relevance.
By aligning with talent, platforms, and moments that already matter to this audience, Head & Shoulders could move from simple recognition to real desirability, embedding itself naturally into the entertainment and conversations that shape modern grooming choices.
Agency Solution
The agency solution was to lean into humour through an unexpected cultural crossover, pairing the beacon of great hair and long standing Head & Shoulders ambassador Claudia Winkleman with a symbol of modern, aspirational masculinity in Farmer Will from Love Island.
Seeing Claudia swapped from sequins and studio lights to wellies and muddy fields, hanging out with pigs, cows, and sheep, created a sharp contrast to her polished Strictly persona and delivered genuine comedy.
By dropping her into farm life and letting the humour play out naturally on TikTok, the campaign humanised the brand, refreshed Claudia’s image for a younger audience, and made Head & Shoulders feel entertaining, self aware, and culturally plugged in rather than traditionally advertised.
Results
The campaign delivered standout results, generating 8.6 million views, 130,000 likes, 1,700 saves, and over 4,000 shares, signalling strong engagement and genuine entertainment value with a Gen Z male audience.
Beyond platform metrics, the work broke into the mainstream, being picked up by the Daily Mail and talked about across the internet for the entire week, proving the idea travelled far beyond paid media. By leaning into humour, cultural crossover, and platform native storytelling, Head & Shoulders moved from awareness to conversation, successfully repositioning the brand as relevant, talked about, and share worthy for a new generation.
