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Mattel Reframes The Barbie Brand In New Campaign Targeting Adults

This article is more than 8 years old.

Barbie Dolls have had a brand image problem the last couple decades and an acute sales problem the last few years. The brand image problem relates to the unrealistic body image that a typical Barbie Doll presents to children. The sales problem relates to relevance. But a new film from Mattel that is part stunt and part ad called "Imagine The Possibilities" looks to change all that.

Have a look.

From body image to self image.

What is brilliant about this highly entertaining film is that Mattel successfully reframes how we think about Barbie Dolls. That Barbie Dolls are not about what the doll looks like, but about how a child looks at the dolls.

In other words, Barbie Dolls are a means, not an end. When we see a child playing with a Barbie Doll it's not a buxom babe projecting negative influence onto the child. It's imagination at work, a blank slate, a world of possibilities shaped like a doll.

Better yet, the film squarely positions the Barbie Doll as a conduit for the development of a child's self image. A professor, a veterinarian, a business woman. Not a bimbo, as many adults have been conditioned to believe, but a business woman.

Because make no mistake. This film is targeted to parents, not kids.

The problems surrounding Barbie were adult problems.

The controversies surrounding Barbie Dolls were never initiated by kids. They were always the product of adults. Makes sense and I am not here to blame adults for worrying about how a Barbie Doll instills an unrealistic body image in kids.

But the problems were adult problems, not kid problems.

As such, Mattel is looking to disarm parents by creatively presenting to them a child's view of the toy. After watching the film, I can almost hear parents (like me) thinking, "Oh, that's how she plays with Barbie?"

In fact, the idea reminds me of Apple's great holiday spot from a couple years ago where they, too, wanted to disarm parents. In Apple's case, they wanted to reframe how parents viewed their kids' faces when they were aglow with the light of a mobile device. That spot surprised the viewer by revealing that the kid was doing something touching and wonderful while his face was aglow. Read more about that one in my, "Love It Or Hate It, Apple's New Christmas Spot Normalizes The Glow."

Mattel is doing the same thing with this film.

Real reactions from adults cemented the message.

Not that I needed confirmation, but I did confirm on the Barbie campaign web site that the adults we see in the film were not actors, but were real adults acting as real adults would to these precocious little girls. Not only did this creative decision add to the entertainment value of the spot, it added a very important strategic element as well.

By seeing other adults understanding and playfully accepting the attempts of these girls to role play as a professor, business woman, and soccer coach, the role playing is normalized. The adults are surprised, sure. But they are accepting. Of course, we don't know that Mattel is simulating a child role playing with her Barbies yet. But when we get the payoff at the end, those adult reactions are still fresh in our minds and closely associated with the payoff.

And that makes it a little bit easier for any adult viewing this little gem to believe that a Barbie Doll is seen by a child as a way to project the child's own image onto the doll, and not the other way around.

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