Durex Marks End Of Covid Restrictions With ‘Freedom’ Billboards

Durex, the sexual wellbeing brand, is marking the country’s lifting of all Covid restrictions with a series of billboards declaring, simply: ‘freedom’.

The tactical advertising campaign, devised by creative agency Havas London, comes off the back of “freedom day” – with last Monday (19 July) representing the first time since March 2020 that people in the UK have been able to have sex with no Covid restrictions. It celebrates the opportunity for people to get back out there and find sexual satisfaction.

The striking billboards, which will appear across London for the next week, depict a giant condom wrapper branded ‘freedom’ in place of the usual Durex logo, accompanied by the words ‘It’s here. Enjoy it.’.

The use of a condom wrapper tacitly reminds people to enjoy their returning freedom responsibly – and recalls Durex’s mid-lockdown campaign Let’s Not Go Back to Normal, which decried ‘rubbish excuses for not wearing a condom’, ‘shaming women for even carrying one’, and ‘One million needless STIs, every single day’.

It ended with this rallying cry:

‘So when it's time to get back out on the streets.

And jump back in the sheets.

Let's not go back to normal.

Let's have good sex.

Safe sex.

For everyone, forever.’

Lindsay Forbes, marketing manager at Durex says: “It’s been a long 16 months. Lockdowns and enduring Covid restrictions have disrupted all our lives in a massive way; not least, people’s dating and sex lives.

"Durex is perfectly placed to allow people to have satisfying sex now restrictions have been lifted, and we’re excited for them to enjoy their rediscovered sexual freedom…responsibly.”