Echo Boom

After many months of looking at various blogs, listening to my husband tell me about RSS feeds, to wrapping my head around the emerging importance of live links…. I have finally managed to peel myself off the couch and start my very own blog.

The focus here will be on a newly emerging and powerful consumer demographic that marketers are desperately scrambling to understand and cater too. A demographic that was said to influence 130 billion dollars worth of purchases in North America – that’s 20% of all consumer purchases – and who also managed to spend over 30 billion dollars out of their own pockets just last year.

Who are these influential people? Meet Generation Y or the Echo Boom Generation otherwise known as the tweens; the most powerful consumers in North America.

As a grad student, who is about to start my MA in cultural studies and critical theory at McMaster in the fall, I am both disturbed and fascinated at the impact marketing is having on our children. As a generation raised almost exclusively on the internet, they are savvier, more adept at using technology and have rightfully come to expect that everything is literally right at their fingertips, just one click away from an answer, a friend, or a purchase. Leaving the obvious question – just what are or rather what will be the effects?

Gone are the times that marketers believed that in order to target kids they had to aim ads directly at the mothers. Instead stores like Abercrombie and Fitch or Limited Too or Ever Girl have realized the value in targeting kids directly. Brands like these are no longer satisfied in promoting just their clothes, rather their aim is to extend themselves into as many aspects of kids lives as possible – and it’s working. As a result a new kind of media literacy is necessary. Not one that aims to tell kids about why products are bad because of the sweatshop it was made in but one that tells them how they are being used and targeted, one that empowers kids by informing them about the real power that they hold.

So there you go, my first entry, my first blog and the focus of my MA thesis. Hopefully this strikes a cord with some of you out there and I look forward to future discussions and updates.