Marketing to Kids

I read an article in Business Week last week about German automakers designing toy cars for kids. BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Audi have all jumped into competition in this market. The cars are small stock-car sleds meant for pre-teens and adolescents. The idea is to acquaint the children with the Brands early before they are of driving age. Therefore, when they are older, they will insist on getting the brand of the toy car they drove.

Marketing to children has been an ethical minefield for years. Children are very impressionable and we, as a society, have a certain revulsion to stuff being sold to them. They are easily persuaded, easily tricked, easily secured as customers. Marketers, of course, see it as bad business not to market to children. Children, after all, are simply future adults. What company shouldn't be concerned about its future? And what about companies that actually make products designed for children? Watch commericals on Nickelodeon or Cartoon Network for a bit. You'll see that marketers lay it on thick for kids.

But kids aren't really the customers, are they? It's the parents that spend the money. Marketers rely heavily, then, on the nag factor--the notion that children will pester their parents until they get what they want. Many people are disgusted by this tactic. They find it underhanded and manipulative of the children. Perhaps they are right. Kids would be better off without the surplus of toys and entertianment they have today. Or perhaps not.

I know that, on a personal level, my childhood would have been severely lacking were in not for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I had toys, cartoons, movies, clothing, posters, books, costumes, everything. When I grew up, I wanted to be a Ninja Turtle. Were the marketers of the Ninja Turtles unethical in what they did to me? I would say no. I would say that they played a vital role in shaping my childhood experience.

I'm not going to pretend that all marketing to children is okay. However, I think it is grossly misunderstood. Marketing is a good thing by nature. It introduces us to new things. As a child, I think that I benefited greatly from marketing. I would have never become a crime-fighting superhero by night if it weren't for the Ninja Turles.