With only a handful of “fans” needed so I can secure a URL for PEM, Facebook showcases its behavioral marketing genius:

Ooh, I want to click that Get More Fans button!

If it’s hard for me to resist, can you imagine how a child’s underdeveloped brain reacts?

If you’re on Facebook, please consider joining — or asking a friend to join — Parents for Ethical Marketing. Don’t make me click that button.

My kids attend a great public school here in Minneapolis and as you might suspect, I keep my eye on commercialism creep there. It is rarely a problem. One day I did notice a busload of kids running into school with brand-new Target bookbags, straight from a Target-sponsored trip to the zoo. I bit my tongue.

Last week my daughter came home with an offer to participate in the McDonald’s All-American Reading Challenge. For every ten books she reads, she gets a Happy Meal. (Didn’t they learn anything from the report card-Happy Meal fiasco?) I wrote the teacher, declining the invitation and asking for an alternative reading “incentive” for my daughter — a book, perhaps?

Another parent brought this one to my attention. It came home with her son from the school lunchroom. It’s a bookmark with a word search on it. Educational!

Find the seven words hidden below that can lead you to a healthy day.

See the first word in the list? DORITOS?

But see, PepsiCo isn’t saying that DORITOS will lead you to a healthy day. That would be crazy!

The instructions say to find the seven words.

And the list has eight.  

Read: FTC Hands Kids Over to Junk Food Marketers, Defying Global Principles

Poor Red Bull can’t catch a break in Minneapolis.

Last summer the energy-drink maker upset some commuting bicyclists and other Minneapolis residents with their giant cube photo exhibit on the Stone Arch Bridge. Some people had a hard time navigating the bridge, others objected to the blatant advertising on public property.

And now this: According to Minneapolis Roosevelt High Principal Bruce Gilman, on October 1, three Red Bull cars (”with the cans on top”) parked on 40th Avenue across from the school while the busses were dropping off students.

The mission? Free Red Bull to anyone willing to cross the street to get it.

The Red Bull employees, members of the elite, seemingly no-boys-allowed Wiiings Team (yes, Wiiings) had already been asked to leave the same area the previous week.

Why wouldn’t the school accept Red Bull’s generousity? For one thing, Gilman said, the Wiiings Team car fleet was blocking traffic, including a school bus. Students were crossing the street and standing in traffic to get free Red Bull samples. And because no Minneapolis school sells or allows students to have beverages other than water or fruit juice on campus, Red Bull isn’t even allowed inside the school.

Gilman approached the team members and asked them to move along. They refused.

“I have never seen such obnoxious behavior,” Gilman said.

Gilman spoke with Roosevelt’s on-duty police officer, Mark Klukow, about getting the vehicles out of the way of traffic. Officer Klukow’s knowledge of Minnesota statutes — beyond the usual traffic laws – provided the perfect solution.

Officer Kluckow said it’s illegal to hand anything out to kids near school property as they are getting on or off a bus.

By this time classes were in session at Roosevelt and the the Red Bull contingent had moved on to their next captive audience at Minneapolis South High. Officer Klukow caught up with them there.

Citations were issued all around.

Gilman called this a happy ending.

And that’s no bull.

Photo courtesy yoppi

Firm perfects smart marketing approach to kids and parents explains how the really smart marketers do it.

To begin, create a product line that isn’t needed or necessary: Skin care for children.

. . . a good niche product geared to a relatively new market with few competitors.

It’s a new market because this company (mysteriously not named in the article) made it up. They invented the market. Thy have no competitors because the Unnamed Company made it up first.

And now, the strategy. The Unnamed Company:

. . . speaks on a kid-appropriate level by using “fun” adjectives such as “friendly,” “sunny,” “happy,” and “funny” to describe the products . . . .

. . . appeals to kids’ sensibilities by packaging the products in bright colors and designs . . . .

. . . added entertainment value to the product line with a CD of silly rhymes and songs to serve as mnemonic devices for developing good skin-care habits.

. . . [created a website], providing a forum for learning more about the ingredients, including the “toxic bad guys” found in everyday products. . . . [and] printable checklists for kids to earn stars for performing their skin-care regimen.

Now that’s how you get kids to ask for and parents to buy a completely unnecessary product.

Here’s another one: How do you get a Mom to buy a knife for her toddler?

They strategically placed the words [Kiddy and cutlery] in discrete places where Moms aren’t likely to see them seeing as they are concentrating on getting out of the store before their kid has a melt down.  

Katherine has a point: Even if it’s not sharp, why would Gerber even consider selling a little toddler knife?

Gerber and Kellogg’s must have attended the same product development workshop: Create and Market Products to Confuse Small Children for Fun and Profit.

On the upcoming makeover of Dora the Explorer, to make her appear older and more feminine: 

Nancy Zwiers, chief executive of Funosophy, a children-focused marketing firm, said the challenge for Nickelodeon and similar networks was that children were migrating to more mature programming earlier.

“The younger kids enter into a franchise, the younger they leave it,” she said. Hannah Montana, originally aimed at children aged eight to 12, was increasingly popular among viewers half that age, Ms. Zwiers said. 

On why Disney is making mobile phone applications for preschoolers:

Disney hopes some of its customers will literally cut their teeth on its mobile products: Inspired by the success of multimedia toys from companies like Baby Einstein, Disney is considering making mobile applications for preschoolers. [Executive vice president of business development and operations for the Walt Disney Internet Group Larry] Shapiro notes that young children love to play with cell phones and busy parents may want a mobile “digital pacifier” to entertain them while on the go. (via)

On why Sears is selling virtual clothing online:

Teens and tweens are making more and more of the purchase decisions, or at least influencing that decision. Mom already knows that Sears provides trusted value and quality, but we need to prove to the teens and tweens that we have the apparel and styles to help them “arrive” at school this year with confidence. . . . And as we continue to expand our outreach to the tween demographic it is increasingly important to expand our marketing strategy to include the mediums where tweens are spending most of their time.

Related posts:
Marketers would like a branch on your family tree
Your heard it here first . . . uh, second: Parents, are you Tweenabees?
A sexualized Miley Cyrus? One word: Disney.

If x ∈ ♀ then |x| =  total weight 
∴ happiness = current weight - (current year - birth year)

The Search for Cool is a British television documentary produced in 2006. This clip shows how a buzz marketing company, Dubit, works with children as young as six to sell Nintendo products:

H/T Autoscopia

Asthma Mom looks at a summer “Fashion Camp” held at a Louisville mall in Teaching Young Girls How to Shop. For Self-Confidence.

The camp coordinator says that while the camp “has a fashion background . . . it also has to do with personal development and self-confidence.”

The personal development must come from these activities:

– lessons in modeling and posing;
– learning fashion terminology;
– putting together and accessorizing outfits;
– understanding the importance of thank-you notes (courtesy Hallmark); and
– standing up in front of the class and describing fashion choices.

The youngest camp attendees (ages 6 to 8) can join in on the fun with these sessions:

– Let’s Play Fashion Seek and Find! (courtesy J. Crew);
– Let’s Accessorize a Dress! and
– What Do I Need To Do to Keep My Skin Pretty?

I suppose an argument could be made for the merits of teaching girls to present themselves in an appropriate manner. That argument would work well in, say, the 1800s. But not today, when we know that the marketing-body-image-consumerism cycle is actually detrimental to girls:

. . . The “quick-fix” of a purchase actually robs [girls] of self-determination, self-awareness, and self-esteem. Encouraged to look outside of themselves for comfort, values and direction, girls become easy prey to addictive behaviors and unrealistic images . . . . In fact, the diet, tobacco and alcohol industries target girls, capitalizing on the body image, weight concerns, and beauty ideals that make them most vulnerable.

And let’s face it: this camp exists only to encourage girls to become shoppers at this neighborhood mall.

“As far as we know, this is the only program of its kind in the country,” says the camp coordinator.

Amen.

Read more: I Want, Therefore I Am: Global Girls in Consumer Culture