By Julie M. Gerhart-Rothholz (@jmgerhart)
Each year, the Super Bowl is watched as much for its commercials as for the football game. I wonder how a company makes a decision to spend millions for 30 seconds, so I watch the game, but I watch the commercials more closely. This year, I was pleasantly surprised to see that three, yes three, Super Bowl commercials featured individuals with disabilities, and it made me wonder, is 2015 the tipping point for more inclusive advertising?
The first Super Bowl commercial including someone with a disability was for Toyota Camry, and it featured Dancing with the Stars alum and US Paralympic Snowboarder, Amy Purdy with a voiceover by Muhammad Ali. The commercial showed Purdy snowboarding, dancing, running, biking, and driving a Camry. The commercial featured the tagline “one bold choice leads to another” and featured the #OneBoldChoice hashtag.
To view the commercial, click here. http://www.superbowlcommercial2015.com/toyota/
If you were looking closely at one of the McDonald’s commercials, you probably saw adorable 8-year old, Grace Ramsburg, who has Down syndrome, the commercial promoting the “Pay with lovin’” promotion, which ran from February 2 through February 14. This promotion had customers randomly selected to “pay with lovin’ as the only required form of payment. People in the commercial were asked to call their mom and tell them her that they love her. Others were asked to dance or to tell their son what they love about him. Grace appears near the end of the commercial with an enormous smile on her face after her family is told their total payment due is one big family hug.
To view the commercial, click here. http://www.superbowlcommercial2015.com/mcdonalds/
The third commercial that featured an individual with a disability was Microsoft’s commercial featuring Braylon O’Neill, who was born without tibia and fibula bones in both of his legs. The commercial shows how Microsoft technology helps Braylon run, golf, play baseball, and do activities typical of a child his age. The question asked on the screen at the beginning of the commercial is “what can you do?”, and that question is answered throughout the commercial from Microsoft’s perspective.
To view the commercial, click here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLXRt-qRBfU
Since the Super Bowl, there have been at least 2 more commercials featuring individuals with disabilities. Comcast has a commercial entitled Emily’s Oz, where a beautiful, imaginative 7 year-old who is blind describes what her Wizard of Oz would look like. The commercial introduces Comcast’s Talking Guide, a service available for those with visual impairments, which describes what is on the screen.
To view the commercial, click here: http://www.comcast.com/emilys-oz?CMP=KNC-IQ_ID_85031494-VQ2-g-VQ3–VQ6-77779792288-VQ16-c-pkw-%2Bemilys%20%2Boz-pmt-b&iq_id=85031494
There is also a pet-store commercial that starts off with a man jogging, and that man has a prosthetic leg.
So far this year, at least 5 commercials have highlighted individuals with disabilities, and there is a broader effort underway to ask 100 retailers in 2015 to feature people with disabilities in their advertising. The effort is called Changing the Face of Beauty. If you frequent Facebook or Twitter, you may see individuals including a picture of their child naming a specific company, using the following hashtags promoting the program: #imready, #15in2015, #100in2015, and #ChangingtheFaceofBeauty. The campaign was started by Steve English and Katie Driscoll who wanted to show the world how beautiful all people are and who both thought it was important to have all people included in advertising. The campaign is receiving much attention in the special needs community, and many individuals are using the hashtags. The original goal for 2015 was to have 15 retailers agree to feature individuals with disability in their advertising, but by February’s end, there were nearly 40 participants, and the goal was revised to 100.
Recently, my son was even featured in an article posted online about the campaign. http://themighty.com/2015/01/these-wonderful-faces-are-changing-the-way-we-define-beauty/
The Changing the Face of Beauty campaign is a success, but there is always room more advertisers willing to feature people with disabilities.
To learn more about the Changing the Face of Beauty campaign, visit www.changingthefaceofbeauty.org.
Already in 2015, progress is being made toward inclusive advertising. This could be a year of big changes, a year where seeing individuals with disabilities represented in commercials and printed advertising becomes the norm.
In 2015, I’m taking action. I’ve done two things that I think can make a difference. I now use the Changing the Face of Beauty Hashtags (for clothing retailers, children’s gyms, etc.). My hashtags have even been liked and retweeted by retailers, so hopefully that will bring about change. I have even received a letter from a CEO thanking me for appreciating inclusion at his company. This company has already shot their inclusive print ads which will debut later this year. The other tactic I use is thanking the advertisers who have included people with disabilities. My hope is that the positive messages will encourage them to continue and increase their inclusive practices. I think 2015 will be a big year for change, and I will do what I can to help that change along. I hope you will too
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional | 11 months | The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other. |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". |
viewed_cookie_policy | 11 months | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. |
We firmly believe that the internet should be available and accessible to anyone, and are committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of circumstance and ability.
To fulfill this, we aim to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. These guidelines explain how to make web content accessible to people with a wide array of disabilities. Complying with those guidelines helps us ensure that the website is accessible to all people: blind people, people with motor impairments, visual impairment, cognitive disabilities, and more.
This website utilizes various technologies that are meant to make it as accessible as possible at all times. We utilize an accessibility interface that allows persons with specific disabilities to adjust the website’s UI (user interface) and design it to their personal needs.
Additionally, the website utilizes an AI-based application that runs in the background and optimizes its accessibility level constantly. This application remediates the website’s HTML, adapts Its functionality and behavior for screen-readers used by the blind users, and for keyboard functions used by individuals with motor impairments.
If you’ve found a malfunction or have ideas for improvement, we’ll be happy to hear from you. You can reach out to the website’s operators by using the following email
Our website implements the ARIA attributes (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) technique, alongside various different behavioral changes, to ensure blind users visiting with screen-readers are able to read, comprehend, and enjoy the website’s functions. As soon as a user with a screen-reader enters your site, they immediately receive a prompt to enter the Screen-Reader Profile so they can browse and operate your site effectively. Here’s how our website covers some of the most important screen-reader requirements, alongside console screenshots of code examples:
Screen-reader optimization: we run a background process that learns the website’s components from top to bottom, to ensure ongoing compliance even when updating the website. In this process, we provide screen-readers with meaningful data using the ARIA set of attributes. For example, we provide accurate form labels; descriptions for actionable icons (social media icons, search icons, cart icons, etc.); validation guidance for form inputs; element roles such as buttons, menus, modal dialogues (popups), and others. Additionally, the background process scans all of the website’s images and provides an accurate and meaningful image-object-recognition-based description as an ALT (alternate text) tag for images that are not described. It will also extract texts that are embedded within the image, using an OCR (optical character recognition) technology. To turn on screen-reader adjustments at any time, users need only to press the Alt+1 keyboard combination. Screen-reader users also get automatic announcements to turn the Screen-reader mode on as soon as they enter the website.
These adjustments are compatible with all popular screen readers, including JAWS and NVDA.
Keyboard navigation optimization: The background process also adjusts the website’s HTML, and adds various behaviors using JavaScript code to make the website operable by the keyboard. This includes the ability to navigate the website using the Tab and Shift+Tab keys, operate dropdowns with the arrow keys, close them with Esc, trigger buttons and links using the Enter key, navigate between radio and checkbox elements using the arrow keys, and fill them in with the Spacebar or Enter key.Additionally, keyboard users will find quick-navigation and content-skip menus, available at any time by clicking Alt+1, or as the first elements of the site while navigating with the keyboard. The background process also handles triggered popups by moving the keyboard focus towards them as soon as they appear, and not allow the focus drift outside of it.
Users can also use shortcuts such as “M” (menus), “H” (headings), “F” (forms), “B” (buttons), and “G” (graphics) to jump to specific elements.
We aim to support the widest array of browsers and assistive technologies as possible, so our users can choose the best fitting tools for them, with as few limitations as possible. Therefore, we have worked very hard to be able to support all major systems that comprise over 95% of the user market share including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera and Microsoft Edge, JAWS and NVDA (screen readers), both for Windows and for MAC users.
Despite our very best efforts to allow anybody to adjust the website to their needs, there may still be pages or sections that are not fully accessible, are in the process of becoming accessible, or are lacking an adequate technological solution to make them accessible. Still, we are continually improving our accessibility, adding, updating and improving its options and features, and developing and adopting new technologies. All this is meant to reach the optimal level of accessibility, following technological advancements. For any assistance, please reach out to