How companies turn students into walking brand-imprinters (with colleges' connivanc)

[ellenrr]

Teams of college students paid by American Eagle (wearing American Eagle T-shirts) welcome new arrivals to campus, carry their stuff to the room, give them Amer. Eagle brand merchandise.

A Target party - where hundreds of students - are driven to a Target store, for a shopping party. By midnight, the store is crowded with freshmen pushing shopping carts full of lamps, pillows, cases of soda and free junk food. A D.J. spins tunes between clothing racks. Students dance the wobble.

This fall, an estimated 10,000 American college students will be working on hundreds of campuses — for cash, swag, job experience or all three — marketing everything from Red Bull to Hewlett-Packard PCs.

Corporations have been pitching college students for decades on products from cars to credit cards. But what is happening on campuses today is without rival, in terms of commercializing everyday college life.
The students most in demand are those who are popular — ones involved in athletics, music, fraternities or sororities. Thousands of Facebook friends help, too.
If companies can hook them early, it often has customers for life. And the choices students make — about shampoo, clothing, computers, smartphones and so on — can become the lifetime habits of future families.

Mr. Youth, a marketing agency, charges corporate clients $10,000 to $48,000 a campus per semester for brand-ambassador programs, for products such as microsoft, Nike, Ford and Hewlitt-Packard.

Alyssa Nation, 21, a junior is a brand ambassador for H.P. laptops. Even when she is not officially on duty, she puts on her H.P. logo shirt, takes her company-issue laptop and positions herself at a campus Wi-Fi hotspot.

“I can tell they believe me,” she says. “There’s a completely different trust level when it’s peer-to-peer marketing.”
She also posts to H.P.’s Facebook site for students and uses her own Facebook account, with more than 1,300 friends, and her Twitter account to promote H.P. student discounts and contests.

Last semester, Ms. Nation painted the H.P. logo and Web site address on her car, using washable markers. She posted photos of the car on Facebook and recruited 15 friends to paint their cars, too.
This fall, Mr. Youth plans to hire more than 5,000 college students among the 150,000 who submitted profiles to its student recruitment network.

Back at the Target party: Over the course of the evening, about 2,200 Carolina students make their way through the aisles. The Vice-chancellor of college Mr. Crisp describes the party as the school’s “signature event” for the start of the school year. “It’s late night. It’s fun,” he says, adding: “It’s an opportunity for us to gather them together on a Saturday night in a healthy, safe environment.” Says one freshman: “This was definitely the highlight of my orientation”.

Red Bull, which has student brand managers at 300 universities and colleges, sponsors everything from chariot races to music lectures.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/business/at-colleges-the-marketers-are-everywhere.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print

[Viking12]

1. It even happens at the elementary school level...

My kids are "official ambassadors" for http://www.gogoscrazybones.com/en">Go-gos Crazy Bones. They get a bunch of free merchandise in the hopes they'll influence other kids to buy.

[Avalux]

2. I think all of this indoctrination has backfired......

these kids have grown up with material crap crammed down their throats; they're told to buy, buy, buy....corps have tried to GROW consumption machines.

But what happens when all the things they've been told they need are out of reach? When they can't get a job to buy all the stuff?

We are witnessing what happens.

[Initech]

4. Exactly - if we can't get jobs, who's gonna buy their crap?

[TwilightGardener]

3. I had to look up "the wobble", never heard of it--

These people look like they're having fun:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFdeskwbhAM

That said, my teen sons are nerdy in terms of clothing, etc.--they don't care where their clothes come from. They are, however, massive gaming snobs--that's the only "branding" they're susceptible to. Edit to add: That and the Axe line. My younger son chokes us with his Axe body spray every morning in the car.

[Initech]

5. Sorry marketers but I'm tired of being marketed to.

[MineralMan]

8. All you need do is not buy.

That seems simple enough. That's what I do.

[Initech]

11. Buying =/= marketing.

You can buy as little as possible and still be bombarded with ads. It's a shame that these soulless marketers are exploiting college students this way. I refuse to be a walking billboard.

[MineralMan]

12. Interesting that you should be talking about soulless marketing.

What's that logo in your signature line, I wonder? Fascinating. Even your screen name is the name of a company.

Pity I'm not in the fragrance and flavor industry, eh?

It's nice not to be a walking billboard, huh?

[Initech]

13. Before you point out any futher hypocrisy...

Yes I know my icon is that of a sports team. Big deal. There's lots of other DUers who do the same.

My screen name comes from a fake company in a movie about how office workers are exploited and try to fight back against the system.

I'm wearing a black collared shirt that doesn't have a tag on it

Search engines are useful.

[nadinbrzezinski]

15. Thumbs up

[MineralMan]

17. There are multiple companies with the name initech.

Here's one:

http://initechinfo.com/

Indeed, Google is useful. The logo you're using is the logo of that company, as well.

[Initech]

18. That site isn't helping your case at all.

The site you linked to has no corporate affiliation - it's a fan site made for the movie "Office Space" which I suggest you go out and rent immediately. :rofl:

[MineralMan]

19. Not interested.

[Dorian Gray]

23. You're

missing out. It's a truly funny film!

[Dorian Gray]

22. Office Space is

really one of my favorite movies. it perfectly captures the pure drudgery of office work and makes it all humorous!

[Initech]

25. Yeahhhhhh... I'm gonna have to have to ask you to come in on Saturday. Sunday too.

[lumberjack_jeff]

6. I love america.

These kids will grow up to lecture the rest of us uneducated lumpenproletariat how college taught them to think critically.

[MineralMan]

9. Just like we did, I guess.

Seems to me that I remember stuff being marketed even back in the late 60s when I spent a lot of time on campus. The local businesses made large efforts to get the college kids into their stores to spend money. When did this not happen? :shrug:

[lumberjack_jeff]

26. The lady drinking starbucks explaining how college shouldn't become a trade school...

... and only the college educated have the critical thinking skills to vote (for instance) vexes me.

I think the primary takeaway from college is; Red Bull gives you wings, dude.

[MineralMan]

7. College students are putative adults.

I imagine they're free to ignore these marketing efforts if they wish. Where is there a place where marketing doesn't take place?

I'm afraid I don't really see the issue here. Target throws a party for college freshmen, gives them some junk and hopes they spend money in the store? OK. Are they compelled to go to Target? I don't think so. Is Target a popular place for college freshmen to shop for cheap crap? Yes. Undoubtedly. So, Target gives them some miscellaneous cheap crap to get them into the store, where they buy some more cheap crap. They don't even have to pay to get to the store. Sounds like smart marketing to me. College kids buy stuff. :shrug:

Much ado about nothing, IMO.

[LanternWaste]

14. A story in the NYT is "much ado?"

A story in the NYT is "much ado?"

God forbid the story runs on network news one evening-- it would be akin to having it forced down our throats.

Seems to me that increasing awareness about advertising methods is a good thing... :shrug:

[Shandris]

21. They're free to ignore these marketing efforts if they wish.

Poor people are free to work harder if they wish.
Handicapped people are free to look for better medical care if they wish.
Handicapped people are free to undertake better research if they wish.
People are free to become rich if they wish.
Women are free to tell attackers 'no' if they wish.
Upset people are free to vote for change if they wish.

Wow, you have an answer for everything! And I'm just POSITIVE that the assloads of cash companies spend on psychological research has ABSOLUTELY NO EFFFECT AT ALL ON ANYTHING. After all, they're free to 'ignore' it.

Mineralman told us so.

[MineralMan]

24. Oh, dear...you are expanding my words.

And misunderstanding them, to boot, not to mention creating a list of false equivalencies. :shrug:

[Retrograde]

10. I'm wearing a promotional shirt now

It's a promo for a book I haven't read. I wouldn't wear it out in public, but it's perfectly adequate for minor plumbing repairs, cleaning the cat box, and all those other chores.

Marketing to students isn't new. When I was in grammar school back in the early 60s we used to get booklets disguised as teaching materials about farming, manufacturing, etc. that all had plugs for various companies promoting their products in those areas.

[nadinbrzezinski]

16. Something is happening here

Exactky what is not exactly clear...

[JVS]

20. Imagine my horror when we all realized that the leader of our motorcycle gang who had been killed...

along with some of the other gang members in the course of a rumble with some cross town rivals turned out to be a peer to peer marketing representative for Harley Davidson.