Branded: the buying and selling of teenagers
Summary
Branded, through startling facts taken from leading marketing publications, internal company reports and extensive personal interviews, investigates the practices of brand-name marketers in cashing in on $155 billion spent by teens on ‘leisure expenses.’ It is written as an exposé determined to bring the guerilla methods large corporations such as Nike, Visa, Disney, McDonalds, Coke and Pepsi use in teen marketing to the public’s attention. The book describes how marketing to the country’s youth involves plastering school gyms with advertising banners and contracting schools to use a certain brand of soft drink vending machines, as well as the recruitment of tens of thousands of teenagers as insider-interns to not only provide the company with current trends, but to advertise merchandise through their use of freebies given away by the company.
A few of the more surprising facts:
· One hundred and fifty school districts in twenty-nine states have Pepsi and Coke contracts.
· A growing number of high schools have corporate sponsorships, from textbooks regularly mentioning Oreo cookies and math problems contain Nike logos, to high school gyms bearing banners and advertisements of sporting goods and soft drinks.
· Companies such as Disney and McDonald’s hold secondary school focus groups for data collection as well as product promotion.
· 55% of American high-school seniors work more than three hours a day to earn the money needed to buy the things they ‘need’.
How easy is it to recruit the “teen-insiders?” If you’re a well-known or trendy brand, very easy! Many teens want to be associated with these brands, and to be ‘working’ for the company gives them the feeling that there opinion matters. What popular teen wouldn’t want to be approached by Gucci or Nike to wear their clothing and accessories in exchange for insider info? Even marketers of the non-trendy brands can find teens to wear their clothing if given away for free, even if just to promote rather than to collect data. Many marketers form "friendships" with young people, recruiting the popular kids to find out what their classmates are wearing, eating, listening to and buying. Along with the ‘taking’ end of the partnership, the marketers ‘give’ these trendsetters free merchandise to wear (pants, tops, shoes, sunglasses) and use (Walkmans, purses, accessories, music CD’s) in hopes that the less popular students will follow their lead. These ‘teen-brand insiders’, once affiliated with a certain company, become ‘Prada girls or Old Navy chicks or PacSun boys,’ showing the extent of their identification and devotion.
Much of the marketing begins at an early age. For example, by the age of ten children can recognize 200-300 separate brands. Children brought up on BabyGap move onto Gap, then possibly Banana Republic or Old Navy (all owned by the same company.) Companies traditionally thought of as “adult” brands such as Prada and Gucci market to teens and “tweens” (those aged 9-14) in hopes to start brand loyalty at an early age.
Marketing Concepts
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