The film is a day in the life of Ash, cast alongside her real family and friends, and the visceral importance of her hoodie. Everything is based on lived experience.

Ash’s morning routine is disturbed by her family running late. She stims with her hoodie to calm herself. This volatility continues through the school day. We see her excel at maths, but when someone accidentally brushes against her in the corridor, it sends her autism into overdrive and she retreats to the sensory room. Once home, she gets paint on her beloved hoodie and asks dad to wash it. The tender way he folds it and places it on the banister speaks volumes. Ash's sister's patience snaps when a therapeutic drum solo interrupts her favourite programme. She takes her sister’s hoodie. This sends Ash into shutdown, but once reunited with her hoodie, she attends school with her close friends.

Vanish penetration has been in decline since 2018 (-102bps). As a premium priced additive, the brand is losing relevance and wallet share, most consumers (70%) still see the brand as a straightforward stain remover only. In fact, in 2021 Vanish reformulated to offer multiple garment care benefits, however awareness of this remains low (46%). Furthermore, as a discretionary laundry additive, Vanish is fighting for relevance against detergents which are increasingly claiming many of the same benefits.

In a category saturated by performance messaging, we needed to move beyond the purely functional and connect with our consumers. We needed a fresh perspective in order to shift perceptions of our product proposition and to drive relevance and usage. We aimed to achieve this via our purpose-led proposition of ‘making clothes live longer’.

Having made the brand connection to support the autistic community, we listened to the community and learnt the eye-opening truth that girls are three times less likely to be diagnosed than boys due to outdated misconceptions. But without a confirmed diagnosis, autistic people and their families can't receive the support they need. Although every autistic person is different, women and girls can be better at ‘masking’ their autism.

The majority of mainstream depictions of autism - include ‘Rain Man’, ‘Atypical’, ‘X + Y’ and ‘I Used To Be Famous’, all of which feature autistic men. Yet, autistic girls and women still remain largely overlooked in an already underrepresented community. 98% of autistic people believe their lives would improve through better representation and understanding Our campaign aimed to help improve women, girl's and non-binary visibility by celebrating their voices and providing support.

Alongside director Tom Hooper, we cast our net wide, putting the brief out via casting agents, Ambitious about Autism's youth network, and Reckitt's network.

From the first self-tapes shared by Kharmel Cochran, we saw something in Ash. Recalls confirmed our suspicions that she was it. A magnetic and talented 15-year-old with a visceral relationship with her hoodie. She’s an extraordinary actress who commands the camera in every frame, despite never being behind it before. Going through the rushes in the edit she was incapable of being false or untruthful.

She could act episodes of great distress without getting upset by representing it. This allowed us to portray stimming and shutdowns on screen. While also showcasing the friendship and humour of our protagonist.

We cast her family and friends alongside her to give an honest glimpse into their life. Together we knew they would make a fascinating subject for this film.