Fearless Girl
State Street Global Advisors2017
Fearless Girl is a 2017 bronze statue installation for State Street Global Advisors, created by McCann, New York.
Why it works
A piece of advertising with no media buy that became a permanent landmark. Installed in the night before International Women's Day 2017, Kristen Visbal's bronze girl stared down Wall Street's Charging Bull to promote State Street's gender-diversity index fund — and within hours was a global photograph, a protest site, and a tourism destination the city chose to keep. It won four Grand Prix at Cannes (Titanium, PR, Outdoor and Glass), among the most awarded campaigns in the festival's history. It is studied for symbol-making as media strategy — one object generating billions of impressions — and for its complications, which are part of the curriculum: the sculptor-brand rights dispute and State Street's own subsequent gender-pay settlement sharpened every later debate about purpose marketing's sincerity.
Techniques
- Guerrilla and ambient Installs a bronze girl overnight, staring down Wall Street's Charging Bull with no media buy, so a single object becomes the campaign.
- Purpose and cause Promotes a gender-diversity index fund by turning women in leadership into a public symbol, timed for International Women's Day.
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