In response to my question about the power of brands last week, I heard many interesting opinions and comments! We are routinely bombarded by powerful messages from food brands everyday. As a toddler parent, you probably feel like you are constantly at war with these messages as you try to encourage your child to eat healthy.
No doubt, food brands have enormous power. Name recognition for Coca Cola, McDonalds, Frito Lay chips (Doritos, Cheetos, Lays etc.) is so strong even 3 year olds know about them! Not only that, their impressions about the core message of these brands form early; exactly what every savvy food marketer hopes to accomplish. Fast food is fun and exciting and soda brands are fun because bubbles are fun and people like them. Once these impressions are formed, they are constantly reinforced by clever advertising and pretty soon there is no escape.
So how do you manage the influence of popular food brands on your kids?
This is the question I asked last week. Here are some of the key points and tips I gathered from reader comments:
- Limit TV and exposure to kids commercials
- Explain to kids that foods shown on commercials are not healthy
- Teach kids to choose healthful foods
- Allow limited portions of “treats”
- Avoid mainstream media and associate with like-minded families
- Be a role model and exercise moderation in using heavily advertised foods
- Be a gatekeeper and control what foods are brought inside the house
- Home is the “sanctuary of healthy eating”
I think all of them are excellent tips for you to use in your battle against the irresistible appeal of food brands. One problem all parents face is that they are constantly having to react to the popular brand message and images. These tips, although useful, fall in the category of managing your reactive response to these brands. Unfortunately, you will never win the battle because the other side spends millions of dollars defending and reinforcing their brand message. They will find a way to break through your defense.
We need to play both defense and offense in this battle!
I have been thinking of an idea I want to share with you. It will allow you to not only have a defensive strategy but also an offensive strategy. I would love to hear your comments because I have not yet fully developed this idea and it remains in a conceptual phase right now.
By an offensive strategy, what I mean is that you need to build your family’s personal brand to clearly define your approach to food and nutrition. I don’t mean to suggest that you don’t have one already, but perhaps it could use some definition and clarity. I say this because not only do we face strong brand messages that try to pull us in one direction, we also face a large amount of nutrition advice from various sources. It can be simply too overwhelming at times!
How do you go about building your family’s brand on food and nutrition?
Brands are developed by highly paid professionals, so it is natural to be a little apprehensive about doing it on your own. Still, there are a few basic techniques anyone can follow! They can be perfected over time with enough practice. Here is a very high level conceptual framework you can use as a first step:
Core Values – the foundation for every brand
This is by far the most important step. It is also the first step!
Brainstorm with your family about what is most important to each member. At this stage, it does not need to be limited to food and nutrition; rather take a big picture point of view and identify about 10 things that are at the core of your family. It could be: being happy, being healthy, being together, helping others, being spiritual, being wealthy, having fun, being adventurous, learning and exploring, being part of a community, being environmentally responsible etc. Think broadly and remember what brings peace and joy to your family; what holds you all together.
Next, select your top 3 based on your current family situation. It may be that your personal top 3 are different from your spouse’s. But I can bet that there is at least one which will be common to both. For example, no matter how we do it, being healthy comes out a common value in our family. If you don’t find anything common in your top 3, you will need to sit down and work together until you find one. Remember, it going to be a family brand, not an individual brand!
Main Message – the core idea behind every brand
Once you have a short list of core values, brainstorm on how your family’s eating habits relate to them. Ask if what you eat, and how you eat, supports those values or if it weakens them. Focus not on the day-to-day details, but the general pattern over a sufficiently long period of time. Chances are that your family’s current pattern of feeding is more or less consistent with your core values. If not, you probably find yourself feeling guilty at times! Looking at your current eating habits through the lens of your core values will help you to clearly identify both the positives and the negatives features.
The goal is to keep the positives and get rid of the negatives. It is important to note that they are your positives and negatives based on your core values. Not because someone else is telling you so. Also note that they are not good or bad, they are simply positives if they strengthen your core values, or negatives if they weaken them.
The main message of your family’s brand on food and nutrition will be based on these positives consistent with your core values. It will be at the core of your marketing strategy!
Logo and Slogan – the marketing tools of every brand
Every brand has a logo and a slogan, which communicate its core idea. This is also something real, something tangible, that the brand owner uses to prevent others from copying the brand. This is where the rubber hits the road!
Why not have something similar for your family? This is how you can communicate with others, seek their support or prevent them from derailing your ideas. This is how you will protect yourself from every little nutrition fad that is made popular by the media. This is what will prevent you from impulse buying just because you saw a commercial somewhere.
Sounds weird? Well, next time your child joins a team notice how they immediately try to come up with a name and a jingle to go along with it. Then someone designs a T-shirt and before you know it, you have a nice, well-established identity for the team. It keeps them together and helps them win against other teams.
Why not have something similar for your personal food and nutrition brand?
Promote with Friends and Family – this is your sales force!
You don’t have the luxury of a strong army of sales professionals and a huge advertising budget to promote your brand. What you do have is the support of your friends and extended family. Help them do the same exercise. Don’t get stuck on minor details – for example, they may not be that much into organic foods as you may be. Rather try to find common connecting points based on common core values.
Think of this as a collection of microbrands all teaming up to be a significant force. Use Facebook or other social media to network with other like-minded people. Before you know it, you will have a collective brand at a much bigger scale!
Protect and Defend – every brand needs a good defense
Big business is fanatic about protecting their brands. They have an army of lawyers to go after anybody who tries to misuse their brands, logos and other copyright or trademark materials. They control how their brands are used and strive for an incredible consistency wherever they do business. They do not encourage use of competing brands by their employees and affiliates. They build multiple layers of defense, both externally and internally, to protect their brand equity. It is simply too valuable to give up.
This is what you fight every day. And this is where you have to make some rules. The list of tips in the beginning of this post is a good start, but you have to make your own rules. Too many rules can backfire, and also difficult to enforce, so try to pick a few and be consistent about them.
Notice how this conceptual framework shows these 4 strategies in a circle with core values in the center. Core values do not change but everything else can be refined and tweaked over time as your family enters a different life stage.
What do you think? I would love to hear your ideas!
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This is a great idea. I believe kids will love to participate in promoting a family brand .
This would be an interesting approach.
I also take the offensive with my kids by teaching them how to pick out marketing hype and warning them that lots of ads and fast food places try to trick kids into eating unhealthy food.
We keep looking for something that can stand up against all the power of food related brands and I think you have a great suggestion here.
Brand Family just might be the tool that will create the change we need.
Keep developing it. I’ll give support where I can.
Ingenious.
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