Australian brands are letting us opt out of Mother's Day marketing

This will be the first Mother's Day since Jodie Roberts lost her newborn.

The 23-year-old, from Seaford in Melbourne, found out 20 weeks into her pregnancy that her second daughter-to-be had a rare heart condition and fetal hydrops.

She was told by the hospital that she would need to terminate her pregnancy because both her baby and her own health complications had become life-threatening.

In July 2022, Ms Roberts gave birth to her stillborn baby after an 18 hour induced labour.

She said her first Mother's Day after Abigail's stillbirth will be difficult.

"I was expecting to hold my baby in my arms but she's not going to be here now," Ms Roberts said.

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She said she will spend the day with her 4-year-old daughter Charlotte.

"I know that Abigail will be in spirit with me but I hope that I'm going to be able to do something where it involves both the girls where I can just have that time with them."

Ms Roberts wants Mother's and Father's Day to be more inclusive of bereaved parents.

"You're still a mum either way, whether your child is living or is no longer with you, and there's not a lot out there for the bereaved mothers."

Red Nose Australia said that the day could be difficult for many people particularly parents who had experienced the death of their only living baby or child.

"They will often express the feelings of 'am I still a mother'?" Red Nose Australia CEO Keren Ludski said.

"Being flooded with emails spruiking all things Mother's Day further exacerbates those feelings.

"Mother's Day epitomises everything they had hoped for. The hopes and dreams they had for their child and their family. Those hopes and dreams that are now shattered."

She said the option to unsubscribe from those emails was potentially empowering.

"[It] allows them a level of protection if they feel they need it. It gives them the opportunity to have a level of control over what comes in to their inbox at a time that they feel they don't have much control."

Companies such as Canva, Etsy, and Archie Rose sent out the unsubscribe option ahead of Mother's Day.

"I think broadly, businesses are recognising that there's no normal family structure, and to that degree recognising that consumers are different," Dr Geetanjali Saluja, a marketing senior lecturer at University of Technology Sydney said.

Dr Saluja said there was an increasing trend for brands to acknowledge social issues and generally be more socially responsible.

"Why should brands just stop at Mother's Day?"

"We can then argue that there would be a lot of triggers that consumers might have and then they should be generally given the option to opt out of marketing emails."