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Consuming Kids: Shows the Dark Side of Marketing to Kids BY age In the film Consuming Kids, It really shows the dark side of marketing to kids. Marketing to kids gives them bad study habits because they will always want to play with their cool new toy that they saw on TV instead of doing their schoolwork. When I was young, I know that’s all I would want to do is play with my cool new toy. I would just keep putting off doing my work and I would tell myself that “Oh I’ll get to it later” and later came and I never ended up getting to doing my work, because why do my boring schoolwork when I can play with my awesome toy.
I think that from my personal experiences, that advertising to kids needs to have some kind of regulation so that kids improve their study habits which could also mean that the U. S. Education system may become better because kids will be more willing to study instead of wanting to buy the new toy they saw on TV. I think the law saying the FTC can’t pass laws regulating marketing to kids should be torn up because it would make kids study more and it would also let the parents save more of their money Instead of always being asked by their kids to buy that cool new toy they Just saw on TV that everyone is getting.
On one side though, marketing to kids could be considered good because it helps them build their imaginations and it gives them a good form of entertainment. If the toy is educational, it could help them with their studying instead of harming it. The restrictions placed on marketing to kids should be for non- educational products like action figures, video games, etc. The current form of marketing to kids needs some kind of reform. In Consuming Kids, It appears that kids ages 5-10 are the most marketed to versus the 1-4 age group. I think this is because the 5-10 age group is more easily influenced by TV advertisements.
There also isn’t as easy of a way to market toys for younger kids because they tend to be more educational and what little kid what say “Wow they’re leaning things by playing with that. I want to go and buy that toy so I can learn too”. The advertising for kids 5-10 has gone way too far. Whenever I’m In the room with my younger brothers when they’re watching TV, I now notice how many advertisements there are for toys on kids TV channels. They all are relatively the same type of advertisement, which shows a group of kids playing with the toy that they are marketing.
When I was younger, I would always think “Wow look how much fun they’re having. I need to go get one of those”. I think that is exactly what the marketing companies are trying to do because they are almost all the same type of ad, Just a deferent toy. With the advertisements to the younger age groups, I think that the ads are more focused towards trying to show the adult the educational benefits for the toy, rather than show the kid why the toy is fun and they should tell their parents to buy it for them.
I do think that the advertising for the younger age groups is definitely not as bad as the 5-10 age group when it comes to the volume of advertisements. Most ads on kids TV channels are for the older age group. Most of ads are annoying too. They are usually louder than the TV show and they use a lot of bright colors. Advertisements for the younger age group are usually quieter and they don’t Know use as many Darling colors In ten ads. I nee ads are also annually Decease they are about half of the show you are watching.
On most half hour TV shows, there is usually 15 minutes of ad time and only 15 minutes of the actual TV show you are watching. You can realize this if you watch the show without ads. It feels much shorter than if you were to watch it on TV. With TV channels for younger kids, there aren’t as many ads and most of the time between shows, instead of ads, they have some kind of an educational program going on. I think that most of the claims in Consuming Kids are true.
I think the biggest thing that convinced me that kids marketing needs changing is the fact that almost all of the top 10 toys today are the same as they were in the sass’s. Another thing was the fact that parents so many billions of dollars on toys for their kids. There is no need for kids to keep buying more and more toys, making their parents waste their money. When I was little, I had so many toys that I didn’t even know what I had to play with. When my parents would clean up the basement, I would always find cool toys that I hadn’t seen in forever.
There is no need for kids to have this many toys. They should just have enough to keep them entertained and not be brainwashed by the ads to go out and keep buying toys to add to their already huge collection of toys. I think it also true that advertising companies try to build brand loyalty for life. They make adults think “Hey that toy was fun when I was a kid, I’m going to go buy that for my kid”. That is I think also most of the reason why the top 10 toys are relatively the same as they ere in the ass’s.
I also think that parents buy their kids toys so they will stop bothering their parents about it. I remember from when I was young, I would Just keep on bothering my parents until they finally thought that if they got me it, I would stop bothering me. The film seemed very accurate with my personal experiences about kids wanting the toys in commercials. Almost every ad I saw, I wanted the toy that was in that ad. That eventually added up to all the toys that I had. I saw something cool and I Just couldn’t go on without the toy so I bothered my parents for t.
I think that is how it is for most kids and that is exactly what the advertisers were trying for. I agree with film about the fact that marketing to kids needs some kind of regulation. They need to regulate the amount of ads kids are shown and how often you can advertise a certain product. There should be more ads for educational things and less ads for non-educational toys. I also think they need to regulate food advertisements. There should be way less fast food ads. I think this is major factor in the childhood obesity epidemic since kids are so easily manipulated.