Shoe brand slammed over ‘inappropriate’ ad campaign featuring little girls in bikinis

A popular Australian shoe brand has responded after being heavily criticized for its recent marketing campaign featuring young girls wearing swimwear.

Billini Shoes launched its Mini Summer 25 collection last week across its social media platforms.

The campaign includes several young girls enjoying various summer activities, from eating ice blocks to playing cards.

One shot shows a little girl reading Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. A light poolside read about toxic relationships and haunting your ex. Just what every seven-year-old needs!

While another shows one of the youngsters taking a “selfie” in front of a mirror while wearing a two-piece summer set.

In one scene, the girls can be seen wearing bikinis paired with sunnies and a wrap over their heads.

However, despite the brand’s attempt to celebrate girlhood, the imagery of children modeling strappy sandal shoes while dressed in bikinis has seemingly missed the mark — with some labeling the ad “inappropriate”.

Beauty influencer Jillie Clark is among those calling the brand out.

She took to TikTok to air her concerns, which many in the comments section echoed.

“I’m calling out one brand in particular today for what I personally feel is a deplorable marketing strategy,” she begins.

“Whether you have children or not, this is a conversation that, as consumers, we should be having and as consumers, we should be holding brands to account for marketing strategies like this.”

Clark explained that she had previously purchased products from Billini, which left her feeling especially shocked by the campaign.

What concerned her most was that the ad had been targeted within her social media feed.

“Billini, I have just been targeted by one of your ads featuring two young girls in their swimwear,” she explained.

“They could not be any older than seven years old, one of which is wearing a bikini and let’s just be honest that is not that different from underwear, and it is a very different thing for a child to be depicted in a market campaign wearing that compartaivley to an adult being depicted wearing that online.”

Clark went on to question why the outfit choice was selected at all, considering the brand doesn’t manufacture swimwear and was meant to be promoting shoes.

“As a brand to use this as a marketing strategy, especially when you don’t even sell swimwear, I find it to be completely and utterly unacceptable that you sat down at a round table and said ‘this is the marketing strategy, this is for financial gain, this is what we’re moving forward with,’” she said.

The comments on her post, many from concerned parents, were full of agreement.

“Just because it’s legal doesn’t make it ethical. The internet is full of sickness. Take it down,” one commenter demanded.

Another wrote: “Say it louder! As a mum, this is just mind-boggling.”

“If you can’t tell straight away what they’re selling, they’ve failed. The ad I saw was NOT a footwear ad,” a third criticised.

On the brand’s official TikTok page, people have started to leave comments slamming the brand directly.

“Marketing and social media team need to do some reflecting,” one person suggested.

“Legal and within marketing laws doesn’t equal appropriate or ethical. Cute clothes, cute shoes (no excessive skin exposure) was more than enough to get the marketing message across,” a second agreed.

Meanwhile, Billini has responded in the comments of Clark’s video, writing:

“Thank you for calling our attention to this, we completely hear your concern and appreciate you raising it. All content from this campaign was created in line with Australian child safety laws, along with strict parental supervision and approval.

“We are taking the matter seriously and are currently reviewing the imagery associated with this campaign to ensure it always reflects our values and community expectations, and of course, protects child safety. Thank you for helping us be more mindful of this in the future.”

News.com.au has requested further comment from Billini.