Every day we seem to stumble on a fantastic new example of the You Sell—marketing messages that pronounce indiscriminately: You're special! You're unique! You deserve the best! Our goal here is to flag creative uses of the You Sell in action, and ideally, to strike up a conversation about what it all means.
One such example: We're constantly being warned of a burgeoning "self-esteem crisis" among girls. As such, for some time now, companies targeting tween girls have bent over backwards to associate their product with self-esteem—as though it were something parents can charge on Amex. American Girl, whose pricey Just Like You line of dolls is designed to mirror each individual girl, tells its customers, "American Girl celebrate's a girl's inner star." Dove, showered with accolades for its Real Beauty ad campaign, has created its own "self-esteem fund" to develop tools and resources that will help girls "celebrate their individual beauty."
A new one we came across this week is Rebelle, a line of handbags for tween girls that, once again, tells parents that an investment in Rebelle is an investment in your daughter's emotional well-being and future place in the world.
"Our mission goes far beyond creating hot looking accessories," write the makers of Rebelle. "It's not just about the look, it's about the message. At Rebelle, our goal is to help tween girls build their self esteem by teaching them to believe in themselves and their friendships regardless of the challenges they face."
The gimmick of Rebelle handbags is that some of them have detachable sub-bags that can be shared and swapped with a friend, a.k.a, their BFF. Of course, this assumes the tween in question has friends. Otherwise, the whole self-esteem angle could backfire.
Stay tuned.
No comments:
Post a Comment