A new ad campaign from the Gap featuring KATSEYE, an international girl group with diverse members, has become an online phenomenon after many on social media have compared it to Sydney Sweeney’s controversial American Eagle campaign.
The multipart Gap campaign features all six members of KATSEYE, who come from South Korea, Switzerland, the Philippines and the United States. One ad shows the pop stars dancing to “Milkshake” by Kelis in Gap’s low-rise denim, a homage to the style of the early 2000s.
“The six-member group blends individuality, cultural diversity, and pop innovation—styled head-to-toe in denim, including a reimagined Long & Lean jean designed to reflect their personal identities,” Gap said in an announcement. “Their multicultural point of view, combined with bold self-expression, has earned them a powerful voice within global youth culture.”
The “Milkshake” ad has sparked a TikTok trend involving fans, especially Gen Z-ers, dancing to the video and matching KATSEYE’S choreography.
The success of KATSEYE’s campaign comes in the wake of the media firestorm around Sweeney’s American Eagle ads, which some critics online have accused of having racial undertones and promoting eugenics. In response to the backlash, the White House and many MAGA Republicans cheered the clothing brand for her casting.
Some social media users have revived the Sweeney controversy by comparing the two campaigns, noting that one features a multi-ethnic girl group dancing to a hit song from a Black singer, while the other starred the white, blonde and blue-eyed “Euphoria” actor discussing her “genes,” in a play on the word “jeans.”
“Dropping this right after American eagle mess is diabolical genius,” one TikTok user commented under Gap’s ad.
“American Eagle could never,” another user wrote.
Fashion designer Megha Rao praised Gap on Instagram for featuring KATSEYE member Lara Raj, an American singer with an Indian background.
“For me, it was a powerful reminder that our kids get to grow up with the kind of representation 7 yr old me could only dream of,” she wrote in a post that has also gone viral on X.
Gap’s ads, however, were not as popular amongst conservatives online. One post by a right-wing user on X amassed more than 44,000 likes by calling the KATSEYE’s ad “woke garbage,” while other critics piled on.
“GAP released an ad in retaliation to Sydney Sweeney’s American Eagle ad…but nobody even noticed,” the post read. “Because it looks like EVERY single woke garbage ad we’ve been seeing for the last 4 years.”
However, the Gap and KATSEYE ad campaign has garnered hundreds of thousands of likes on YouTube, over 3 million likes on TikTok, and more than 2 million likes on Instagram, as the company continues to release additional content from its collaboration with the pop group.
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