On Aug. 19, 2025, GAP, an American-style clothing brand, released their “Better in Denim” commercial. This consisted of a dance collaboration with global girl group KATSEYE to the song “Milkshake” released in 2003 by Kelis. Since 1998, GAP has been making dance collaborations with popular songwriters of that year. The very first dance collaboration was with Khaki Swing to the song “Jump, Jive, ‘An Wail.”
The making of KATSEYE
In 2023, KATSEYE debuted through Netflix’s show “Dream Academy,” a show where girls audition to be in a pop group. At the end of show, the group of girls were chosen by Geffen Records and Hybe Corporation to be KASTSEYE. In June 2024, the group released their debut single named “Touch” which has had 432 million streams since its release.
According to SBS Star, As of June 29, KATSEYE has placed three songs on the Global Top 200 chart including their song “Gabriela” ranked at 12, “Gnarly” at 59 and “Gameboy” at 121.
The GAP ad
The latest ad from GAP featuring girl group KATSEYE has been a viral hit over all social media platforms. A week after its release, the ad had a total of 23 million views on TikTok, according to Forbes. Using a platform that everyone uses and a well known girl group, GAP has accumulated viewers from all ages from all over the world. The campaign received lots of attention from older generations for its use of the song “Milkshake,” and got lots of attention from younger generations with the appearance of KATSEYE.
The ad followed the release of a controversial American Eagle ad featuring Sydney Sweeney on July 23. This ad sparked debate because some believe that it promoted white supremacy, with the use of wordplay between “jeans” and “genes.”
“I thought it was weird how [American Eagle] did [the ad]. I feel like they should have worded it differently if they really knew their intentions. So yeah, if they worded it differently, I feel like it would’ve been a better ad,” junior Marisabel Rodriguez said.
Both the jean companies GAP and American Eagle used celebrities to appeal to the younger ages to advertise their brand and jeans. With the release of both ads it has caused people to compare them because of the difference of style of ad.
According to Forbes, the KATSEYE ad was focused around “Y2K-inspired content that feels both fresh and free, tipping its cap to the brand’s heritage in dance and visual identity, particularly with its monochromatic background,” while American Eagle “oversexualized” Sydney Sweeney to advertise their jeans.
Freshman Liliana Rodgers, who watched both the Sydney Sweeney and the KATSEYE ad, felt only one ad swayed her to buy the product.
“I didn’t really like the ad because of the way [Sweeney] said her jeans are better and her jeans being blue. It just was overall really weird, unlike how the GAP ad made it actually fun and made me want to buy their jeans,” Rodgers said.
