The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2025
Innisfree's milk-essence ad had an influencer pour cream over her lips — viewers read sex
Innisfree's ad showed an influencer pouring milk essence over her lips, eyes closed. Viewers called it sexualized; Innisfree deleted the scene and apologized.
Innisfree · 2025-09-23
What happened
In September 2025, Korean beauty brand Innisfree released a promotional video for its Green Tea Ceramide Milk essence, featuring influencer Bbooo, who has more than 400,000 subscribers, demonstrating the product on camera.
In the scene that drew criticism, Bbooo poured the white, cream-like essence over her lips and into her mouth with her eyes closed. Viewers on Korean social media said the imagery read as sexual rather than as a skincare demonstration, with comments calling it 'mocking women' and questioning what the campaign's planners had intended.
Innisfree apologized in a Korean-language post on X on 23 September, saying it had 'received feedback from some customers regarding the discomfort they experienced' and had deleted the scene, adding it would be 'more meticulous in its entire process, from content planning to final review.'
Why it happened
- A demonstration shot chosen for close-up intimacy can read as intimate in the wrong way — pouring a liquid onto lips with eyes closed carries a visual grammar skincare ads don't usually reach for.
- An influencer's own delivery style shapes how a brand's script lands — the same product beat, filmed differently, would not have drawn the same reading.
- Innisfree's own account of what it will change — 'more meticulous...content planning to final review' — names the entire pipeline, which is another way of saying no single checkpoint had caught it.
The lesson
Innisfree's ad had an influencer pour milk essence over her lips with her eyes closed. Viewers read it as sexual, not skincare, and the scene was deleted within days.
Aftermath
Innisfree removed the scene from the video and pledged tighter review of influencer content from planning through final approval.
Sources
- S. Korean beauty brand Innisfree apologises after skincare ad sparks backlash — The Star
- Cosmetic brand removes controversial advertisement after public backlash concerning content — Korea JoongAng Daily
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