Tweens 8-12 are responsible for $40 billion annually in spending power! They probably know more about current brands than they do about history, current events, or civics. But, at what expense? Have marketers created Brand Brats?
Just ask parents of tweens today, and I’ll bet you’ll hear a saga. Marketers have done such a good job that they only want to wear and use the “right” brand products. It’s all about peer pressure and it’s paying off big for companies using this psychology to sell their goods.
The Today Show conducted a focus group of tweens (with their parents watching from behind the focus room glass) as part of a series called, “Kids, Inc. Today’s Brand Savvy Tweens.” Here’s what took place:
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So, what do you think? Are tweens today just a by-product of effective marketing? Have marketers gone too far in creating these Brand Brats? How is this affecting parenting? Is it good for the economy?
Tags: brands, Marketing, Today Show, tweens
Hi Elaine,
Good post. My consultancy has been packaging products for all kids’ demographic groups for two decades. Tweens are the hottest segment for marketers. They not only have great purchasing power, they also influence family purchases to a higher degree than ever before. Parents have increasingly asked their growing children to participate in the decision-making process when making purchases. Kids are product and brand savvy from a young age now. They are also tech savvy and use the Internet proficiently. So, parents often seek out the opinions of their kids.
BTW: James U. McNeal of Texas A&M has studied kids’ demographic groups. In his research, he states pre-school children readily identify brand logos. From the time children are infants and toddlers, they are exposed to many product brands that are appealing. Especially if they tie in to hot licensed properties like Sesame St. characters.
By the time kids are tweens, they see themselves as “almost teens” or young adults. They are still receptive to their parents’ guidelines and opinions even as their peer groups exert considerable influence over them. It’s up to the adult gatekeepers in the lives of tweens to help them understand the way the marketing world works and to be discerning about the products they choose to purchase.
I’m not sure this is new generally, but rather in the breadth and depth of its impact.
. So it’s no wonder a 10-year old can achieve a high score at the “logo recognition” game.
We live in a world where kids are coddled and kept indoors to consume a billion more times the media I ever did growing up (showing my age, of course, but remember when you’d just go grab your bike and ride off to a friend’s house and play outside for about six hours without any store-bought props?
What i find sort of amusing is that many marketers pretend they can market to kids who have wants but no needs (the latter are handled by the parents), yet when the kids become adults with real economic-oriented needs, the marketing tactics smell the same. “Peer pressure” is a life-long phenomenon.
Thanks for the info, Ted. In your opinion, do you think parents are acting as gatekeepers to help them understand the way the marketing world works? Should media studies be part of middle school curricula?
Kevin,I agree that life was much simpler when we took off and played outside all day without our parents knowing where we were. They trusted we were somewhere in the neighborhood.
Peer pressure has always been part of the tween and teen experience. Yet, with the advent of technology, kids are now bombarded by marketing messages all day long. Do you believe that these “Brand Brats” are a relatively new phenomenon or were the boomers and X-generation similar?
I think marketers are doing a pretty successful job of targeting their ads directly to tweens.
Of course, they have no other needs of their own but with a bit of marketing magic and advertising fantasy, tweens are asking their parents to only buy them the “right” stuff.
Hi Elaine — Nice post and interesting clip with my friend Martin Lindstrom!
I’m not so sure that the impulse to own certain brands is all that unique to Tweens today. When I was 12, I coveted Levis jeans (EVERYONE wanted a pair of jeans with that little red tab on the pocket) and Converse sneakers.
That said, those were simpler times. Retailing has been taken up a few notches since then (to say the least), so kids are truly bombarded with a whole lot MORE everything (more stuff, and more marketing behind that stuff).
Toss in an explosion in both mass media and digital channels to reach the tween demographic, parents with disposable income, a huge cultural and societal shift in parenting generally … and I think you start to get a picture of the key drivers behind some of the behavior exhibited in that video.
Thanks, SGA. I agree – marketers are doing a phenomenal job!
Ann, I agree that tweens have always been vulnerable to marketing and advertising. I wanted a Barbie doll so badly when I was a kid. I couldn’t watch the TV spots without yearning for one. And that was from one medium only. You’re right; kids are bombarded by messaging today.
I don’t think tweens are any more band savvy now then they were 20 years ago. I remember begging my mom for the latest brand name clothes. I wanted No Fear shirts, Umbro shorts, Abercrombie & Fitch jeans. I think the difference today is the actual spending power these kids have. My mom would never have given my a credit card to go shopping for school stuff, or a big wad of cash. If I had $5 cash when I was that age I thought I was rolling in dough. Now these tweens are walking around with cell phones, their own debit cards, and tweeting about how independent they are.
I guess my point is that it’s not the kids that have changed, it’s the parents.
Tracy, you have a good point. Maybe it’s a combination of increasing marketing messages targeted to tweens, coupled with doting parents.
I agree with the other posts that tweens today are no more brand savvy than we were. They are far more heavily bombarded today because of sophisticated, cross-channel marketing and the greater number of advertising avenues that are available to marketers.
My real concern, as a parent, is that this is being perpetrated by adults who should know better. These are marketers, roughly in the 30s-50s age range, who work for these brands and many of whom probably have children. They apparently see no harm in perpetrating the myth that having material goods, especially name-brand ones, will make a child happy, cool, popular, or even worse, sexy.
In my opinion, they are helping destroy children’s souls by pushing the false and damaging notion that what matters is outside appearance, not the inner soul. Frankly, they’re one step above drug pushers. Makes me glad to be in B2B marketing.