Ever wondered how marketers make so much money and how they make products only kids are attracted to? Well it’s mainly the psychological part of it. You might also be wondering what are the risks of this. These are unhealthy food, unsafe technology,and forceful marketing.
The first concern to all mothers, teachers, and doctors is the risk of unhealthy food.
Corporations such as Mcdonald’s, Wendy’s and Sonic put toys in their kids meals to make kids want their food. The average mcdonald’s happy meal is about 500 calories. That is obviously way too many calories for a child around the age of 10. Wendy’s puts toys in their happy meals that let you create and build your own toy. This gets kids’ creative side flowing and gives them fun maybe on a long car ride. But, unfortunately the menu is not very healthy. Sonic gets kids and family’s attention by having their employees bring you your meal on roller skates. Also, they give the 50’s feel by having a drive in restaurant. Though, their food is very unhealthy.
…show more content…
Today’s kids are all about social platforms such as snapchat, instagram, twitter, and the list goes on. The way a lot of companies get money is through ads. They make money off of ads and they put something that the kids would be interested in on the ad. Everytime a kid clicks on the ad, the company gets money. Sometimes they will ask for their email or name and that is not very safe for kids at a young age. Computers are changing the way advertisers make money in today’s economy. Marketers are taking advantage of kids’ minds because they are oblivious to the world around them. Today, companies like fruit loops, cheetos, mcdonalds, and many more are manipulating the minds of kids to make them want their products. The companies use things like clowns, toys,and tigers to make kids get interested in their products. Most kids are interested in things like characters in a TV
From cartoon and sports to having the toys in meals in a huge display and lowered. There are even advertisements that trick adults. They are convincing, but it can all be stopped with just simple reminders that it’s not real or it’s not good to have this in your body. These reminders can help America become less obese and more health conscious and can even affect the way children think as they grow up surrounded by them. The United States is slowly increasing its awareness of the condition that it is in by companies improving foods and people paying more attention to the nutrition’s in foods. Also many food companies have died down on television advertising for kids, but it is still found in other expressed ways. While it is okay to advertise the question of is it okay to advertise to children is still not answered. It all depends on the consumers what is right and wrong and how to approach each product. Obesity from these products can be cured by hard exercise, but this is not recommended for children. It is more efficient for children to just eat healthy as they are still growing each day. So the next time an ad pops up on the screen and that little girl or boy is focused on it try to explain to them by reading the ingredients or the nutrition label why they should not eat it often. With small steps like these children
This leads to all the issues involving advertising. In an article titled, “Facts About Marketing to Children,” it states, “Advertising directed at children is estimated at over $15 billion annually…” In fact an average youth is exposed to an estimated 5,000 ads annually. This shows that advertisers know that it is easier to convince a child to want their product rather than an adult, and this is why they target children and teens. Also in the article, “$211 Billion and So Much to Buy American Youths, the New Big Spenders,” it talks about how much time youths spend on the internet. 76% of 8-9 year olds spend more than one hour on the internet per day and 91% of 16-17 year olds spend more than one hour on the internet each day. Since the average amount of ads seen per day is 500 ads, in just one hour there are about 20 ads seen by children. This comes down to that the more ads that youths see, the higher the risk of all the problems ads
In the article, Every Nook and Cranny: The Dangerous Spread of Commercialized Culture by Gary Ruskin and Juliet Schor (Ackley 361). Since the early 90s is when Commercialism has bombarded the society. Ruskin and Schor provide examples why advertising has an effect on people’s health. Marketing related diseases afflicting people in the United States, and especially children, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and smoking-related illnesses. “Each day, about 2,000 U.S. children begin to smoke, and about one-third of them will die from tobacco-related illnesses” (Ackley 366). Children are inundated with advertising for high calorie junk food and fast food, and, predictably, 15 percent of U.S. children aged 6 to 19 are now overweight (Ackley 366). Commercialism promotes future negative effects and consumers don’t realize it.
...oft drinks, or candy. Parents like me trying to give their children a healthy example are overwhelmed just as the 5-a-Day campaign?s $2 Million advertising media budget is overwhelmed by McDonald?s $1.4 Billion media budget. Morgan Spurlock jokingly suggests fighting fast food?s impact on his child by punching the child in the face every time they pass a fast food restaurant to attach a negative association to fast food. Instead I plan to show Super Size Me to my child when he is old enough to understand it, as should all responsible parents.
McDonald 's has associated its self with anything that could attract kids into insisting on getting them. A Happy meal has a toy usually associated with the newest movie or television show that kids are unquestionably excited about. Such as the commercial where Spider-man leaps out of the television into the living room of a random kid saying he cannot “hang around”, as a voice-over comes in and states it’s “because the action is at McDonald 's” then goes on to state what neat items they could receive in each happy meal. All while the kid is filmed having an enjoyable time, the lighting brightens the kids face and smile, and the music creates a sensation that one must go to McDonald
That's a lot of money but in 2007, CBS news estimated that advertisers spent $17 billion on children. Compare that to the amount of money advertisers spent on children in 1983 ($100 million according to CBS news). This is due to deregulation in 1984 which basically allowed advertisers to target kids as much as they want. The money kids spend has gotten so high because kids see something heavily advertised on TV (maybe even in a movie or TV show) and nag their parents until they buy it for them. Most kids can't even help but like the product because the youth often believe everything they
Since it is being taken care of by others and is not an unknown factor of the world. However, even in these cases, we cannot allow future notice of children to be turned into hyperactive manipulative consumers in advertising schemes, for the sake of the future. Works Cited Schlosser, Eric. A. & Co. The "Business" - "The Business" Kid Kustomers.
The land of the free, brave and consumerism is what the United States has become today. The marketing industry is exploiting children through advertisement, which is ridiculously unfair to children. We are around advertisement and marketing where ever we go; at times, we don't even notice that we are being targeted to spend our money. As a matter of fact, we live to buy; we need and want things constantly, and it will never stop. The film, Consuming Kids , written by Adriana Barbaro and directed by Jeremy Earp, highlights children as this powerful demographic, with billions of dollars in buying power, but the lack of understanding of marketers’ aggressive strategies. Children are easily influenced and taken advantage of, which is why commercialization of children needs to stop. Commercialization to children leads to problems that parents do not even know are happening such as social, future, and rewired childhood problems. Government regulations need to put a stop to corporations that live, breathe and sell the idea of consumerism to children and instead show that genuine relationships and values are what are important.
Since the fast food industry is targeting America’s youth, providing healthier options on children’s menus will reduce the rate of childhood obesity and allow for a healthy future.
Ask a teenager what their favorite fast food restaurant is and most of them will probably say McDonalds. "McDonalds operates approx. 30,000 restaurants on 6 continents, and feeds about 46 million people in a single day! In the U.S. alone, McDonalds accounts for 43% of the fast food market." Manhattan alone contains 82 restaurants packed into the island (Super Size Me). McDonalds has been criticized by the media and other people for offering too many unhealthy choices on their menu, therefore leading to obesity in America. Eating too much McDonalds, or any other fatty food, will give you many long term health problems.
“When children watch television, they cannot escape food advertising. “Sugared snacks and drinks, cereal, and fast food advertisements respectively comprise approximately thirty-two percent, thirty-one percent, and nine percent of all advertisements marketed specifically to children.” (Termini, Roberto, Hostetter) Due to limited cognitive abilities, children view many food advertisements, and don’t really have the knowledge or capability to comprehend that the food being advertised is not healthy. They don’t believe that anybody would want to sell them something that harms them, so they might plead to their parents to get them that cereal with the funny talking frog on the cover, not knowing how much sugar is in the cereal, and how harmful it is to their bodies.... ...
This makes children’s interest trivial and superficial. For instance, most of children refuse to buy any cheap products. They prefer most famous shop such as H&M, Splash, and Matalan and other brands. This help them to think that the fashionable and people who buy from expensive brand are the best people. As well, it causes them also to communicate with these people only. Thus they will be arrogant and judge people from their forms. In addition, not all parents have the ability to buy from the expensive brand and they try to reduce their spending in order to give their kids they needs and wants. Moreover, several ads seen currently include harmful stunts that kids try to do them. Due to, do not aware and understand the dangerous of it. For example, the ads of Red Bull drink that give energy for people. The company of this drink advertised this drink by famous quote which is “Red bull gives you wings”. Also they are representing this quote in ads. The last bad influence that can considered as the most essential one, is that the advertising can effect self- esteem by makes them feel inferior which weakens the personality of the child. Thus , it causes the kids hate their parents. Due to, the parents do not satisfy their children in the brands they want, food or any other
Across America in homes, schools, and businesses, sits advertisers' mass marketing tool, the television, usurping freedoms from children and their parents and changing American culture. Virtually an entire nation has surrendered itself wholesale to a medium for selling. Advertisers, within the constraints of the law, use their thirty-second commercials to target America's youth to be the decision-makers, convincing their parents to buy the advertised toys, foods, drinks, clothes, and other products. Inherent in this targeting, especially of the very young, are the advertisers; fostering the youth's loyalty to brands, creating among the children a loss of individuality and self-sufficiency, denying them the ability to explore and create but instead often encouraging poor health habits. The children demanding advertiser's products are influencing economic hardships in many families today. These children, targeted by advertisers, are so vulnerable to trickery, are so mentally and emotionally unable to understand reality because they lack the cognitive reasoning skills needed to be skeptical of advertisements. Children spend thousands of hours captivated by various advertising tactics and do not understand their subtleties.
McDonalds chicken nuggets were my favorite meal as a kid. Theres nothing like getting a free toy and some greasy food. However, I 've gotten older and my palette has changed. As a kid I struggled with obesity and fast food was a major contributor. I now live in an area where fast food is really not an option. On the other hand, some Americans only option is fast food.
As a little girl I loved watching television shows on Saturday mornings. I’d get upset when a show would proceed to commercial. That is until I watched the shiny new toy being played with by the girl my age and of course the cool new one that came into the happy meal, then I’d forget. After seeing the appealing commercial I’d run to my mom and try to slickly mention it. “You know McDonalds has a new Monster’s Inc. toy in their happy meal. Isn’t that great? “Now I realize that back then I was targeted by big companies to beg my parents for things that I didn’t need or that wasn’t good for me in order to make money. Advertising today is affecting the health of today’s children because they eat the unhealthy foods advertised to them on: television, the internet, and even at school. Therefore, an impassioned discussion of possible solutions has been brewing.