Levi's 501 Jeans

Levi's 501 Jeans

The 501 are a genuinely unique product, first manufactures in 1873 in

San Francisco and are unchanged to this day. The 501 Jeans are

timeless, well designed, functional, adaptable and classic.

Traditionally Levi's were worn as hardwearing trousers for working

men. Cowboys and Californian farmworkers throughout the century wore

them. In the 1950s Levi's meant jeans and jeans meant youth. Levi's

were associated with the youth culture of sex, rebellion and heroism.

Popular heroes of the youth culture such as Elvis Pressley and James

Dean represented this at the time in America. It was also the time of

57 Chevrolet. This fifties look and a fascination with and worship of

an American of the past of wide open spaces, cowboys, freedom are what

the advertisers drew upon to raise the popularity of the jeans in the

1980s.

In the 1960s and through to the mid 1970s jeans were an international

uniform of the young. They conjured up images of youthfulness,

rebellion and an America that young people really aspired to. In the

late 1970s Levi's were beginning to acquire a my dads jeans image and

sales began to fall dramatically. Levi's sets out in the 1981s to re

establish Levi's 501's as the jeans worn by the core 15-19 year old

male target market. It was crucial that they become an exciting

commodity.

The general and common theme of the adverts that I saw had sex appeal

with young attractive male models. The models were either dressing or

undressing. While dressing or undressing there are shots of the male

models underwear. Other common themes for the adverts are romance and

sexual relationships. The common characters are young attractive male

models. The storylines are to do with the youth culture- sex, romance

and rebellion. The soundtracks for each advert are the hit song of the

time the advert was made.

There is American culture and the way of life in American at the time

in each advert. The soundtracks were all popular rock or classic song