FCB Inferno: This Girl Can dance to Disney with her children

Daily chores, work, the school routine, family time, Netflix. Between the things you have to do and the things you want to do, there’s little exercising time for a mum. And Sport England’s research shows that 61% of UK mums would feel guilty about taking time to exercise, rather than spending time with their family.

Research also showed that family time enjoyment is the number one driver that motivates children to get active, mothers have a greater influence on their children’s activity levels compared to fathers, and seven in ten (69%) mums think it is important for their children to see them exercising.

So it has combined the two.

This Girl Can put out a Facebook post which invited families who love to dance together to send in videos of themselves. The result was an astonishing number of submissions, the overwhelming majority from mothers and daughters. As a result, the team was able to cast real families from the This Girl Can community to take part in a first series of short films, inspired by Disney, that teach mums choreographies to their children’s favourite Disney music and show mums doing them with their kids.

The five three-minute films were created by FCB Inferno and produced by Fuel Content. The dance tutorials are an extension of This Girl Can, which is all about encouraging and celebrating women getting active, no matter how they like to do it and regardless of shape, size, age or ability. It’s a set of fun, family moments that get mums and kids moving together.

The films demonstrate that the activity is enjoyable, that there are no “wrong moves” and inspires mums to copy the idea.

The films are the result of a partnership between Sport England and Disney Healthy Living, which uses the power of its characters to inspire families to get active and were created by FCB Inferno. It is the first time that This Girl Can has worked with a brand partner to create original content and is the first of several key partnerships launching over the next year to create new opportunities for women to get active by embedding their convention-busting messaging into bigger brands and platforms – helping mums to find ways to get moving that they’ve never thought of before.

Kate Dale, This Girl Can campaign lead, stated, “We wanted to create something that unlocked the fun factor of moving around, based on the ways real mums and kids get moving. That’s why we invited real families from across England to dance around to Disney tracks they love, including songs from The Little Mermaid, Moana, The Jungle Book, and the new Disney Channel Original Movie, Descendants 3.

“We knew we wanted to open the door to brand partners, but we needed to protect the integrity of the movement and ensure that any partnerships were fully aligned with the spirit of This Girl Can.”

Marianthi O’Dwyer, vice president, Healthy Living UK at The Walt Disney Company, added, “We know from Sport England research that children of active mothers are more likely to grow into active adults, so working with This Girl Can to create fun, authentic content that uses the power of Disney storytelling to inspire mums and kids to have fun while breaking a sweat, is perfectly aligned with our Disney Healthy Living strategy. The fun dance-along videos offer a fantastic resource for mums looking to improve not only their own fitness but also their children’s long-term health and we hope families across the UK enjoy getting active to these wonderful Disney songs.”