KATSEYE And The Gap Made Advertising Enjoyable Once more After A Yr Of Rage Bait

The Gap will all the time be well-known. See, 2025 has been an actual doozy of a 12 months so far as advertising and marketing is worried. From Sydney Sweeney’s “Good Jeans” American Eagle advert to Matt Rife’s unusual E.L.F. Cosmetics advert, rage bait appears to be the key sauce for a lot of manufacturers this summer time.

From Sweeney waxing poetically about her superior genetics with an ill-received double entendre for American Eagle’s “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans” advert—which was largely overshadowed by claims of eugenics. Meanwhile, Rife, who likes to joke about home violence, starred in a make-up advert for E.L.F., which famously caters to girls. Odd habits throughout.

But not each firm appears misplaced within the sea of concern advertising and marketing.

KATSEYE, The Gap and variety

A number of weeks after Sweeney’s advert about her superior “jeans,” The Gap and worldwide lady group KATSEYE have launched a rhythmic advert to a barely altered rendition of Kelis’ “Milkshake.” The “Better in Denim” advert, choreographed by Robbie Blue, was met with widespread reward, the precise reverse of what occurred for Sweeney and Rife.

“i love how they used this song and the song is saying ‘its better than yours’ which is probably them poking fun at Sydney Sweeney,” one individual commented.

“Now THIS is how you promote jeans,” one other individual wrote.

Some even introduced it again to the Mean Girls days: “I saw Katseye wore gap jeans so I bought gap jeans.”

While not a direct retaliation, the advert landed as the proper reprisal, and it even earned the best honor an advert can obtain in 2025: a viral TikTok dance break. Beyond the replication issue of the dance, the Gap’s “Better in Denim” advert celebrated variety quite than taking a dig at it.

America’s tradition shift

As the final word mall model and emblem hoodie champion, the Gap has been a pillar of American purchasing tradition because it was based in 1969. And maybe the one factor extra iconic than The Gap’s giant emblem hoodies is its iconic denims adverts. With only a jingle and a dream, The Gap modified the idea of denim advertising and marketing endlessly with its “Fall into The Gap” advert and within the 50-plus years since, The Gap has created iconic adverts that commemorate all creations, creeds and identities.

It’s fairly sobering to suppose that simply 5 years in the past, what The Gap is doing could be thought of normal observe, and now it nearly acts as an advert de résistance in these more and more conservative occasions.