Kids' opinions hold sway

For those of us who have a brick and mortar store and actually deal with the everyday mom and child, we are sure you will totally identify with us when we ask, "Who are we shopping for at market, the parent or the child?"

As we get a little more seasoned in this business, this has become a very important question. We have begun to take notice of the decision making and buying power today's child brings in through those doors. It seems like more and more parents are allowing their children to make the decisions as to what they should buy for them.

Little girls and boys as young as 2 or 3 are being asked if they would wear this T-shirt or that dress, these shoes or even their opinion about the family car. If the answer is yes, you have yourself a sale, if the answer is no, back on the rack or showroom floor it goes.

The advertising gurus today seem to know exactly who has the buying power in the household. Aside from the expected ads geared toward kids, companies are advertising everything from where to go on vacation to what car the family should drive to soccer practice.

It seems that about seven out of 10 parents are no longer willing to take a chance and spend their money on their child without the child's opinion, risking that something will sit in the closet or toy chest or worse, the kid will be embarrassed by being driven to school in the wrong car.

When it comes to spending money on consumer goods, Madison Avenue apparently never underestimates the power of a whining child. And as the advertising industry increasingly aims commercial pitches directly at the very young, more and more advertising companies are turning to child psychologists to help them hone their messages.

Who by now has not heard of Hannah Montana, a.k.a. Miley Cyrus, the 14-year-old Disney star who's "brand" will extend from TV to music and Nintendo to the virtual realm Disney is building. Move over Tinker Bell, times are seriously changing.

You ask do ads directed at toddlers work? According to Dr. Allen Kanner a leading clinical child psychologist of 20 years at the Wright Institute in Berkeley, Calif., they do.

"Recent studies have shown that by the time they are 36 months old, American children recognize an average of 100 brand logos," Kanner said.

There is reason for concern because now advertisers are making their pitches to younger and younger audiences, many not yet out of diapers.

The child has become the advertiser's sales reps in the home. Children believe commercials are true and don't understand advertising techniques. TV brings children into the market place before they are developed emotionally or are intellectually mature enough to understand.

Studies show that children younger than 12 spent more than $28 billion of their own money in 2000, while directly influencing the spending of $198 billion more, according to an article by American Demographics.

James McNeal, professor of marketing at Texas A&M University, has studies that show children's spending has roughly doubled during each decade and shows no sign of slowing down.

"Children are the largest and fastest-growing market for consumption," McNeal said. "Car companies, toy companies, clothing and food companies know that children influence their parents' choices of goods purchased in the consumer arena, so they pitch their ads to be attractive to kids and so on. The influence that children have on spending, either on themselves or for their parents, is something the marketers today keep their fingers on the pulse of, thus shaping our children's' values on material things training their consumer spending patterns as adults."

At Chocolate Milk we're asking again, who should we shop for at market? The parent, because that is who we relate to as adults and identify with as parents, or the child, who seemingly has a very strong, loud voice and clearly a very influential (but not yet savvy) buying opinion in our store?