Posts Tagged ‘food commercials’

While children are learning their alphabet, they are being beckoned by coco puffs, fruit loops, and a fleeing array of goodies. Childhood obesity is stemming from they are exposed to television commercials.

Safe Haven

Home is not a safe haven anymore. Childhood obesity starts in front of the TV. Those resourceful technically savvy advertisers converge in your living room. Childhood obesity is partly due to the time spent in front of the television viewing commercials.

The earnings outlook for most kid oriented products depends on their ability to reach children. Tots influence parents buying habits.

Branding

Children see an average of one food ad every five minutes during Saturday cartoons. Junk food boot camp for toddlers will produce a junk food junkie in the future. In a flash a young mind is captivated by the child likable advertisements.

Parents are lost in the confusion; these products have all kind of seals of approval. With a host of trusted slogans, reliable validation from other children who are still standing after consuming the faux food, parents are torn.

Branding comes from animation embellished with both visual and audio to effectively deliver its message.

Wild vivid colors, upbeat tone, and great designs produce high conversion rates.

Pitch

“Advertisers have been clever about building brand loyalty, making these foods seem attractive,’’ Dr. Zimmerman said. “I was talking with one of my graduate students who was saying, ‘When I was a kid, it was just a dorky rabbit talking about Trix.’ Now it’s about being cool, and what’s fun and exciting. It really grabs your emotions much more powerfully than it use to.”

Dr. .Fred Zimmerman,  author and chairman of University of California Los Angeles’s Department of Health Services, said “television commercials for sweetened cereals, junk food and fast food chains probably has an insidious influence over a child’s food preferences. The more television commercials a child is exposed to, the more likely he or she will be to try those foods and want to continue eating them, which then increases risk for weight gain.”

Reasoning

This is a different look at the role of TV in a household. It seems that children are not couch potatoes. Young children will stand, jump and wiggle while watching a show.

Now, the reasoning is that some TV time is not the reason for obesity. This takes into account the fact that most children are successful at moving about. There was a study that suggests that the culprit in weight gain was the growing array of commercials aimed at children.

This study was by the University of California, Los Angeles, compared children’s viewing habits. They found no association with obesity in the children who watched videos or commercial-free programming.

For Profit

The difference is that commercial television is a for profit enterprise. The market value of a show is how many commercial sponsors it can pick up. What TV does is integrate entertainment with strategic advertising.The advertisers wants a reliable audience. That is one that is vulnerable and trusting. Who better fits this description that a wide eyed hungry toddler.