CVS Health has announced a ban on photo manipulation in its displays and promotional images, saying it will no longer enhance photos of models in displays and ads for its store-brand beauty products.
In addition, the drugstore chain said it will ask other makeup and beauty brands to act similarly by 2020 or risk a label placed on promotions alerting customers that the images have been altered, USA Today reported. CVS has 9,600 stores nationwide and is among the largest sellers of beauty products and cosmetics.
The move was announced Monday by CVS Pharmacy president Helena Foulkes at the National Retail Federation’s convention in New York and reflects a growing realization that enhanced images contribute to unrealistic expectations about how women should look. These expectations can lead to health issues such as eating disorders or can contribute to someone having unnecessary plastic surgery, USA Today noted.
The company plans to use a “CVS Beauty Mark,” which is a watermark on the packaging that tells consumers that the images used have not been changed or manipulated. The “beauty mark” will also be used on CVS social media accounts and on its website, Today.com reported.
The retailer joins others like Target, which in March 2017 released unretouched swimsuit ads featuring women of many different shapes and sizes, according to Today.com. E-retailer ModCloth took a no-Photoshop pledge as far back as 2014.
“As a woman, mother, and president of a retail business whose customers are predominantly women, I realize we have a responsibility to think about the messages we send to the customers we reach each day,” Foulkes said in a statement. “The connection between the propagation of unrealistic body images and negative health effects, especially in young girls and women, has been established.”
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