Marketing to Children

No matter the economic situation, the advertising and marketing machine rolls onward and as it rolls it is reaching a younger and younger audience. Barbie has her own credit card and Monopoly has gone away from cash to using credit card like cards. Dave Ramsey would be ashamed.

Electronic monoply

Beyond the marketing, psycologists have been taking note of how these trends to younger subjects are likely to have long lasting trends…

Advertisers recognise that brand loyalties and consumer habits formed when children are young and vulnerable will be carried through to adulthood.

via Marketing to Children.

This trend to younger audiences for marketing is not only because of the financial abilities of today’s youngsters but because they are holding onto their parent’s purse strings as well as their own. Besides that, these kids are forming habits that will last well into adulthood.

According to Direct Marketing magazine, by the age of eight children make most of their own buying decisions.[20] Modern children can often recognise brands and status items by the age of 3 or 4, before they can even read. One study found that 52 percent of 3 year olds and 73% of 4 year olds “often or almost always” asked their parents for specific brands.[21] Advertisers recognise that brand loyalties and consumer habits formed when children are young and vulnerable will be carried through to adulthood. Kids `R’ Us president, Mike Searles, says “If you own this child at an early age… you can own this child for years to come.”[22]

Via Sharon Beder, ‘A Community View’,

Kids will definitely pick up on what they’re taught whether it’s good habits or bad. This applies to lots of things including financial responsibility.

Along with the toys that teach about endless credit, there are other resources out there that teach parents and in turn kids how to be good with money.

Here’s a bank that helps kids budget from an early age. Ramsey has “cool tools for teaching kids about money”

According to a Visa survey, parents are turning their eye to the wisdom of teaching about good financial management. In fact financial topics are starting parent/teen conversations even more than drugs or sex:

Money management is a higher priority among parents, according to a new Visa USA survey. Eighty-five percent of 1,000 parents of high-school students said they will be discussing it with them, ahead of other important topics, drugs (80 percent) and sex (79 percent).

Some great advice I saw for parents was from Disney, of all places… In her article,  Laura Rowley gave some key recommendations like:

  • Create a Dream Jar for them to save up toward a goal or “dream”,
  • Start their experience with Saving, giving  and even selling (on eBay)
  • Develop negotiation skills from a young age
  • Don’t be a human ATM machine.

Telescopes: Glimpsing Saturn

A view of Saturn

A view of Saturn

I remember the first time I looked through a telescope and really saw something fascinating.

I was in college and a local family had sorta adopted me and some friends. The mother of the family was a science teacher and she enjoyed developing projects for her students. One afternoon she told us about a skywatch student group that was getting together to look at Saturn. It sounded fun, and it’d be a chance to get off campus and not spend a lot of money. So we went.

That night we looked through the eyepiece of a cardboard tube telescope. It must have only been about 6 inches in diameter, but as it swept the dark sky, I found myself enthralled because, for the first time ever. I could see for myself: Saturn really does have rings around it. Oh, I’ve seen the cool NASA photos, but for the first time I was seeing it with my own eyes…with the help of that telescope. Sure it was small and blurry, but I could see those rings and that was all that mattered. Mars’ red tone had nothing on those fascinating rings.

Since then, I’ve had the privilege of being around a few telescopes and visiting with people who make them like Gary Singmaster
There is a lot of advanced technology out there like the ones Singmaster makes or the Meade ETX-AT my brother‘s wife bought for him for a gift complete with tracking motors and the like, but I still remember my favorite telescope is that one that showed me the rings of Saturn for the first time. Wow! Across those thousands of miles such a beautiful creation lay spinning away. Seeing that for myself brought out a childlike wonder in me.