Branding and the toddler demographic

Don't you just cringe when you hear "It's just a logo", or stand in slack-jawed bewilderment when you're told "Lighten up, branding isn't everything"..? Friends, family and more clients than I care to recall have had no real concept of just how powerful branding can really be.

McDonalds has carved it's iconic "M" into the minds of nearly every consumer nation in the world, from the oldest to the youngest. I just read this regarding the latter...

[excerpt from Chicago Tribune: A McDonald's logo on carrots? ]

They found that children preferred the tastes of the hamburgers in the McDonald’s packaging over the same foods in unmarked packaging (48 percent vs. 36 percent.)

The children also preferred McDonald’s branded Chicken Nuggets (59 percent vs. 18 percent) and French fries (76 vs. 13). Even McDonald’s packaged milk  or apple juice (61 vs. 21 percent) and carrots (54 vs. 23), which McDonald’s doesn’t even normally sell, came out on top.

If you're a parent, news that 2 & 3 year old children have brand consciousness isn't really news at all. Likely you've ran into something  like this before - Little Johnny just loves a particular type of cereal, but turns up his nose at the same cereal sold for a portion of the cost under a different 'store brand'.

The products can taste identical, and are often even produced from the same raw materials by the same manufacturer, in the same facility. The store brand however suffers from a lack of brand influence, since they lack the jolly little leprechaun, befuddled bunny, or positive thinking tiger to hawk their goods.

It would be a bit hypocritical for us, as logo designers, to think ill of those evil geniuses manipulating the minds of our children. However, there is a chill in my spine when I recall the power that we wield as brand forgers and marketers. 

While our clients' products and services may differ only slightly from their competitive counterparts, our job is to recognize those diferences and shape them into a brand, not just the simple, iconic logomarks we produce to make our daily bread - but a red hot iron to sear our message into the collective conscious of the consumer.

When the frustration of working on yet another "Cheap Logo" gets you down, recall the power we wield as brand forgers. Wield your power with care, for as my dear uncle Ben once said... "With great power comes great responsibility"... or did I hear that somewhere else..?

I ran across the Mcdonalds story checking out our 'News' section (a collection of logo & logo design related news from around the web). If you're not checking it out daily, you should be - some great stuff comes across there.