Sick and tired of the product placements seeping into everything your child watches on television?

So is the Campaign for a Commerical-Free Childhood, who got together other concerned organizations — children’s media watchdogs, public health advocates, consumer groups, and child advocacy groups, including Parents for Ethical Marketing — and wrote to the FCC asking the commission to adopt a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) regarding product placement and integrated marketing on television.

“The diversity and breadth of this coalition reflects the growing concern that marketers are hijacking television content and foisting branded propaganda on an unsuspecting public,” said [CCFC Director] Dr. [Susan] Linn.  “The rise of embedded advertising deprives parents of the ability to protect their children from unwanted marketing influences, threatens public health, and undermines democracy.” – Press release

Some facts from the letter:

– 69 percent of parents are concerned that their children were exposed to too many ads in TV programming;

– TV product placement revenue grew 33.7 percent to $2.9 billion and product placement occurrences rose 13 percent in 2007, with 25,950 placements in the top ten shows;

– Cable programming is even more saturated, with 163,737 occurrences in the top ten shows;

– On American Idol alone, there were 4,151 product placements in the first 38 episodes this year, and branded content jumped 19 percent to a total of 545 minutes, or 14 minutes per episode. 

By adopting the NPRM, parents, caregivers, and advocates will have the opportunity to let the FCC know what they think of integrated marketing; the FCC is required to take those comments into account when they consider new regulations.

Of course, some people think that, while it’s okay to look into the problem, nothing should really be done about it. They would like to see the FCC issue a Notice of Inquiry, which would only require an investigation. Nothing else. Let’s see, who would want to continue turning television shows into infomercials? I guess that would be the American Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA), the American Advertising Federation (AAF) and the Association of National Advertisers (ANA).

But not to worry. Remember, one of the FCC commissioners just stated publicly that the FCC should issue the NPRM.

And when the FCC adopts the NPRM and it becomes open for public comment, I’ll let you know.

See also: Timeline: FCC and Integrated Marketing

UPDATE: FCC Is Urged To Clamp Down On Product Placement at Marketing Daily

Photo courtesy AndrewEich

This entry was posted on Friday, June 20, 2008 at 6:09 am and is filed under Television, The Goals, Legislation, How Marketers Think. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.