The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2025
Japan Post's ad about hiding a bare face from a delivery driver was gone in a day
Japan Post posted a short of a woman using a toy robot arm to hide her bare face from a delivery driver. Viewers called it sexist; deleted the next day.
Japan Post · 2025-03-05
What happened
On 5 March 2025, Japan Post Holdings posted a short comic video to its official X account to promote a new signature-free delivery service. It showed a delivery driver trying to get a woman's signature at her door while she — insisting she couldn't be seen without makeup — used a toy robot arm to sign for the package without opening the door fully.
Viewers criticized the video for treating a bare face as something shameful to hide and for reinforcing the idea that a woman's undone appearance is inherently embarrassing. Complaints called it 'blatant misogyny' that 'promotes the stereotype that going without makeup is something to be ashamed of.'
Japan Post removed the video on 6 March, a day after posting, and apologized on its official X account: 'We received a range of opinions about the video posted on our account. We are taking them seriously and have deleted the video. We will pay close attention going forward to prevent a recurrence.'
Why it happened
- The premise required the audience to already accept that a bare face needs hiding — a joke built on an assumption that large parts of the audience reject isn't a joke to everyone, it's an insult.
- A comedy pitch about avoiding embarrassment works only if the embarrassment itself isn't the thing under dispute — here the embarrassment was the entire complaint.
- One day between posting and deletion is fast, but it still shows the read wasn't caught before publishing — nobody in the approval chain flagged the premise itself.
The lesson
Japan Post's ad joked that a bare face needed hiding from a delivery driver. Viewers called the premise sexist, and the video was gone within a day.
Aftermath
Japan Post deleted the video and pledged closer review of promotional content, without detailing what its approval process had missed.
Sources
- 日本郵政、女性の'すっぴん'扱う動画がXで物議→削除する事態に — ITmedia NEWS
- 日本郵政「すっぴん動画」炎上から学ぶ！プロモーション動画に潜むリスク — Looops communications
spotted an error? The club wants to know.
More like this
Utena's AI 'Moisture Warrior' ad looked enough like Sailor Moon that it got pulled
Plucharm's 'Nobel-winning' hair tonic ads faked proof and a sell-out
Gao Guang's Nobilun ads were paid SNS posts disguised as word of mouth
Somewhere, someone solved the problem this company failed at. 2nd Opinion →
Comments · 0
Sign in to join the comments.