Dear Santa, Do You Have My Brand-18p

Dear Santa, do you have my brand?
A study of the brand requests, awareness and request styles at Christmas time
Received (in revised form): 6th August, 2001
Aron OCass
is a senior lecturer at Grifth University in the school of marketing and management. He has a bachelor of commerce majoring in marketing, a master of business majoring in marketing and a PhD focusing on consumer behaviour. He has published on topics such as political marketing, voter choice, consumer brand associations, service choice behaviour. His publications appear in the European Journal of Marketing, Psychology and Marketing, Journal of Product & Brand Management, Economic Psychology, Journal of Services Marketing and Journal of Advertising.
Peter Clarke
has a Bachelor of Commerce majoring in Marketing and Human Resource Management with 1st Class Honours in Marketing. Peter Clarke has delivered papers on consumer behaviour at Anzmac and World Marketing Congress conferences. Research interests include consumer behaviour, gift giving and buyer behaviour at Christmas, and historical or cultural icons as consumption objects.
Keywords:
Branding, childrens consumption, content analysis, Christmas
Abstract This study examines brand awareness (preferences) and request styles (communication approaches) at Christmas of Australian children and adults. The study is founded in the growing Santa Claus literature that has examined various issues related to gift giving and request behaviour at Christmas time. The study is based on the content analysis of 422 letters written by children to Santa Claus. The results indicate that children are brandorientated in their request behaviour, adopt fairly meaningful request strategies and use visual imagery ie graphics in their communication strategies in their attempts to secure their requested gifts and specic brands.
INTRODUCTION
Christmas where the gum trees grow There is no frost and there is no snow Christmas in Australias hot Cold and frosty is what its not When the bloom of the Jacaranda tree is here Christmas time is near To ride around the bush where its dry To cart all the presents piled so high A red nosed reindeer would never do Santa should jump on a kangaroo (Sabegal, undated)
Dr Aron OCass School of Marketing & Management, Grifth UniversityGold Coast, PMB 50 Gold Coast Mail Center 9726 Queensland, Australia Tel: +61 7 5594 8139 Fax: +61 7 5594 8085 E-mail: A.Ocass@ mailbox.gu.edu.au
These words are from a favourite Australian Christmas song a
reminder that snow, reindeer, elves and maybe even Santa Claus seem out of place in Australia. Yet this Northern hemisphere myth of Santa, symbolism and all the Christmas activities are just as evident at summer time in Australia as they are in in the norths coldest, darkest winters. Even more evident is the transition of this festive season of sharing and celebrating the birth of Jesus into the season of giving, and more often than not, giving and requesting lots. The new gods of Christmas now worshipped, are toy
Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 2, 1, 3753 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817
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Aron OCass and Peter Clarke
companies and their marketing armies (elves). Although Christmas is the cornerstone of Christianity, it is also the time of Santa and gift giving (Caplow and Williamson, 1980). With the complicity of parents, Santa Claus is the embodiment of a request culture that endorses and encourages hedonistic behaviour which contributes to the socialisation of children into the selfindulgent consumption associated with the materialism of Western cultures (Belk, 1987). Such requests are made known to Santa either during a visit to the Santa village located in a shopping centre or offered as a written wish list to Santa in a letter. SANTA, CHILDREN, PARENTS AND SOCIALISED REQUEST BEHAVIOUR The participation in request behaviour associated with (the tradition and myth of) Christmas is an important socialisation process where adults teach children to become consumers. Bahn (1986) describes socialisation as a process of attending to and knowing objects by, means of the senses, while Mochis (1985) argues that this process relies on the primary involvement of parents and the family in general. This process is important because it helps to develop preferences for purchasing and consuming certain products over others and may extend to brand preferences, and both parental and marketplace information contributes to a childs brand awareness, familiarity or knowledge. Children are increasingly participating in family decision processes (McNeal, 1992) and becoming important marketplace participants through a number of contemporary social factors such as increasing household afuence, growing independence allowed to children and greater consumer socialisation (Lackman and Lanasa, 1993; McNeal, 1992). If there is previous experience or exposure, Phelps and Hoy (1996) suggest that either childrens or adults
attitudes toward familiar brands have a strong relationship with a positive purchase request, purchase decision or both. This dominance of some brands over others at Christmas time has important social and marketing implications. In the area of childrens decision making, Bahn (1986) maintains that older children make judgments on multiple attributes while younger children discriminate on one or maybe two attributes. Research into childrens consumer activities as early as the 1960s has indicated that children inuence purchase decisions in the general categories of confectionery, snacks, cereal and soft drinks (Ward and Wackman, 1968). Increases in the range of product available to children has occurred, however, because licensing arrangements are moving brands targeted at children into product categories of apparel or juveniles merchandise (Miller, 1990) and there has been a growth in products and brands now targeted at children. Thus, a broadening of what might be termed childrens product categories is being seen. Children are becoming more orientated toward fashion with popular character motifs (Haynes et al., 1993), rock paraphernalia (Otnes et al., 1994b) and sports icons. They also have a strong inuence in the purchase decisions for shoes and video games (McNeal, 1992). In Australia, the Christmas period accounts for about 60 per cent of the A$2.2bn annual sales in a leisure market which consists of product categories such as traditional toys, clothing, confectionery, audiovisual, books, stationery, sports, furniture and accessories (Meegan, 1993). Although the traditional toys and clothing still dominate, audiovisual, sports and furniture are indicative of the increased range of products that appeal to children. Moreover, children are turning to contemporary products such as audiovisual equipment, electronics and computer-based games that account
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for approximately 20 per cent of the Australian toy market (Vowles, 1996) and, in general, Australian children aged 14 to 17 own high-tech products in comparable percentages to Australian adults (Schiffman et al., 2001). Children now have an opportunity to express their preferences in an increasingly expanding range of products and while request behaviour is not the sole domain of children, it is accentuated at Christmas time and adults are placed under enormous pressure to deliver the goods (the right brand). CHILDREN AND BRANDS Hite and Hite (1995) argue that children use product attributes to judge and create preferences for brands of products. They also express their preferences in personal purchases (McNeal, 1992) or request others to make purchase for them (Ward and Wackman, 1968). John and Sujan (1990) have indicated that children categorise products through visual cues of shape, package, colour and size. Generally, younger children cannot read and they often use brand names or symbols as attributes (Ward et al., 1977) or packages as brand cues (Hite and Hite, 1995). According to Percy and Rossiter (1992) such visual images are often enough to stimulate a response by children to a brand and use non-product attributes to identify differences in brands. Children appear to know the value and use of brands to nominate their preferences across a wide range of products. It has been argued that children over the age of two appear to have the capacity to recognise, classify and evaluate brand or product alternatives (Macklin, 1994) that satisfy their own desires and openly express these preferences through letters written to Santa. Toy brands have extended into product areas not previously considered as a childrens domain (Miller, 1990; Haynes et al., 1993; Otnes et al., 1994b). Children, however, often become highly familiar with nationally advertised
brands at an early age (Hite and Hite, 1995; Reda, 1995). Therefore, requesting a brand is not necessarily a restriction to the product category of toys but a continuation of that brand across other product categories that a child seeks to own or consume. According to Miller (1990), childrens recognition and knowledge of brands is such that they know one brand name can cover requests as diverse as cereal, soft drinks and confectionery to household linen, toiletries and magazines. Children may understand the concept of brand extension (Hite and Hite, 1995) and they should be able to nominate multiple requests for a brand name over a number of categories to display a multiple brand-orientation in their request behaviour. Children may be brand aware and parental encouragement in requesting and acquiring product and brand knowledge may be prominent at Christmas and communication in this period should cover such aspects. REQUESTS WRITTEN BY CHILDREN AS COMMUNICATION Similar semantic phrases that cover logical and affective appeals as well as position formation appear in both oral and written approaches to communication phraseology. For example, written lists can omit words or phrases to allow greater effect, with the sender sorting statements into some perceived order or grouping (Erftmier and Dyson, 1986). Young children often write about animals or people, but they prefer to write in the non-narrative format of lists, short notes, signs and labels (Shook et al., 1989). Such communication approaches allow key words, phrases and concepts to be sorted into a perceived order or grouping for stronger effect, and can be re-read and checked by them (Wetton, 1996). Weiss and Sachs (1991) indicated that boys generally followed the strategy type of rules, fair play and reason, while girls used a format of
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statements or questions. This gender effect indicates that boys use the art of reason, while girls simply expect the request to be honoured. Although there are differences between oral and written communications, children appear able to adapt their communication strategy to different situations such as a visit or a letter to Santa at Christmas. HYPOTHESIS FORMATION Given the lack of research on brand identication and request behaviours of Australian children at Christmas, there is a need to combine the request items, phraseology and illustrative content to help understand how children express their desires. Younger children do not have the access to purchase products directly and television advertising encourages request behaviour in this group through familiar messages such as ask mom to get one (Kunkel and Roberts, 1991). Hite and Hite (1995) argue, however, that children appear to be able to recognise and rely on brand name and package cues to nominate their preferences. Both boys and girls brand knowledge seems to be alike because they generally have similar exposure to a number of different and varied sources of information, learning and entertainment (McNeal, 1992). Caron and Ward (1975) suggest television is the major source of information for childrens request choices and children also accompany adults to shopping centres (McNeal, 1992) and because of such exposure children know and use brands to express their wishes precisely. The similarities in exposure to products and brands as well as the encouragement of unrestricted request activities at Christmas for boys and girls suggest: H1 : There will not be a signicant difference between the number of brands requested by boys and girls when children write letters to Santa. Otnes et al. (1994a) refer to politeness as
a socially accepted form of ingratiation and an integral part of any request strategy. Erftmier and Dyson (1986) infer politeness is an essential component in written communication and also a form of friendship or solidarity in the affective appeals via written and verbal approaches, If politeness is a socialised trait, then: H2 : There will not be a signicant difference between the politeness of girls gift request strategy and boys gift request strategy. Weiss and Sachs (1991) suggest boys oral strategy is based upon rules, fair play and reason which means they seek the why challenge of direct statements and do not use an indirect request communication style. On the other hand, girls expect any requests to be honoured through simple, yet indirect requests. Such views suggest that girls should be less direct in the way they write requests and therefore: H3 : The letters girls write for themselves will contain signicantly more indirect request strategies than letters boys write for themselves. Since lists and pictures constitutes a form of written communication and children generally have similar exposure to information or learning, expectations are that: H4 : There will not be a signicant difference between the numbers of illustrations contained in girls and boys letters to Santa. RESEARCH METHOD Some adults may want to know what their children desire as Christmas gifts and persuade children to write a letter to Santa, that openly describes, identies or requests the gifts they desire . The letters seemingly act as a surrogate request to parents and
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generally are considered to be a written expression of intent, behaviour and intrinsic values that openly express feelings within the broad topic of Christmas wishes (Richardson and Simpson, 1982). The awareness and knowledge of brands and gifts together with semantic phrase and illustrations are identiable and measurable within the content analysis research method. Content analysis is an acceptable research method used to evaluate the content of recorded information (Kolbe and Burnett, 1991; Zickmund, 1994). Content analysis is an unobtrusive method that negates biased responses and is used to gauge behavioural or affective consumer responses (Kolbe and Burnett, 1991; Malhotra et al., 1996). It has also been used in a variety of research contexts, such as television commercials (Olney et al., 1991) and printed advertisements (Belk and Pollay, 1985). Importantly, letters to Santa Claus have previously been used as a source of data for content analysis (Caron and Ward, 1975; Richardson and Simpson, 1982; Downs, 1983; Otnes et al., 1994a,b). THE STUDY A convenience sample of letters written to Santa was obtained from a national retailer in the run-up to Christmas. The retailer enjoys a high level of patronage across its outlets and encourages adults and children to post a letter to Santa in the Christmas village precinct of its stores. These letters reect the importance of the request tradition and are a suitable source of data. Individual stores within the retail chain forwarded convenience samples of letters received, and they constitute an adequate sample for the study. Following similar procedures and recommendations adopted by Otnes et al. (1994) and Richardson and Simpson (1982), a number of letters were excluded some because they were generated by keyboard and their true authorship could not be satisfactorily established
and others because they were only scribble drawings or illegible scrawl. Letters requesting single items as a shared gift (for example, a trampoline for a sister and brother) caused difculty in identifying a singular recipient. The current study also excluded the non-committed request style that sought plenty of toys, surprises or something nice. Also, specic requests by children for gifts of pets, or gifts to their pets; requests by children for gifts for parents; requests by parents for gifts for themselves; requests for conspicuous consumption items like a million dollars, travel, boats or cars, which are not realistic gifts for a child; and requests for boy friends or calendar pin-ups were excluded. Otnes et al. (1994b) excluded letters written by adults because they were considered to hold an adults view. The present study also identies that letters containing such statements as I am three years old and mummy is writing this letter for me are written entirely by adults, and as such, are an adult view irrespective of whether the letter is or is not dictated or inuenced by the child. Finally, exclusion of the letters that combine efforts of both adult and children in writing the letter to Santa, which could be categorised as partnership letters, were undertaken because there is difculty in assessing the instigator of the letter. The nal sample of letters was categorised via ve specic characteristics. The rst was the gender of the child, second the authorship of the letter and the third was the aggregated brand request styles. The other two concern the use of semantic phrases and illustrations. The number of categories and the ease of implementation inuence any approach to establishing intercoder reliability and agreement (Krippendorf, 1980; Perrault and Leigh, 1989). A simple approach to intercoder reliability requires fewer categories, and therefore less
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opportunity for error. The authorship construct developed for this study is narrow with two elementary categories and the disagreement between judges was minimal. Any disagreement about authorship of a particular letter negated the use of that letter. All other categories were adequately summarised through previous construct guides and the coding process is explained in the following paragraphs. Child authors were identied through such statements such as I am ve years old and writing to ask for . . .. A further indication of child authorship was the handwriting script that is currently taught to children and is noticeably different from previous generations writing styles. Children also tend to write in different colours and use pencils or crayons rather than blue or black pens. They also form larger gures and write in an erratic style. Therefore, a childs letter is readily identiable as being solely written by a child. For letters authored by adults, it is noticeable that the continuity of these letters is mature in expression, the letter formation uniform and the writing script is different. Such letters are easily identiable as being solely written by adults. The second construct of brand request style qualies the manner in which
brands are requested. The concept of branding identies, denes and reinforces those unique characteristics and differences within product categories and therefore a specic name identied the request as a brand. A baby doll, for example, is a generic request within a category of baby dolls, but a NewBorn baby doll is a specic doll within that doll category and therefore a brand. Branded requests also included store brands such as K Mart; sports team names such as Broncos (an Australian Rugby League team), CDs such as Spice Girls and low prole brands that may be catalogue promoted items. Conrmation of brand names was through an examination of store shelves and catalogue searches. One author has 17 years experience in the toy and gift industry with an additional 12 years in Christmas retail operations and subsequently coded each request by allocation of a unique brand identication number or recorded as a generic gift request. This study uses the same categories to describe the construct of brand request styles as Otnes et al. (1994b) where they identied ve brand request styles. Table 1 provides the descriptions and examples of the coding for the brand request style construct. The branded requests were coded
Table 1 Examples of request style coding Request style Brand-obsessed (Mentions only one brand and no other gifts) Singularly branded (One brand mentioned along with other nonbranded gifts) Brand majority (One brand is mentioned more than other brands) Pluralistic (Two or more brands mentioned equally) No brand mentioned Examples Requested one gift only, eg a Design-a-Mug brand Requested three gifts only, eg each branded Space Jam Requested two gifts, eg one for the brand Bananas, the other unbranded Requested four gifts, eg one for Barbie, the rest unbranded Requested four gifts, eg two for Barbie and one each for Bananas and Sky Dancer Requested 12 gifts, eg three branded Nike, one branded Sony and the rest unbranded Requested seven gifts, eg one branded request each for Barbie, Fashion Avenue and Polly Pocket, the others unbranded Generic requests only such as a teddy bear, a doll or a truck
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into the ve categories as developed by Otnes et al. (1994b) and then combined to form the aggregated brand request construct that addresses request behaviours in this study. The creation of this summary set of data allows the retention of the authorship construct, but aggregates the brand request construct to three unique, generic categories that indicate the brand request styles at Christmas. The brandxated (brand-obsessed) and singularly branded categories nominate only one brand. These became a general category of one brand. The brand dominant (brand majority) and brand plural styles request more than one brand and attract the grouping name of many brands. The no brand mentioned category retains that name. Table 2 offers descriptions of selected communication strategy constructs, meanings and statement types taken from Otnes (1994a) and concentrates on communication and socialisation issues of politeness, direct and indirect (or compound) request strategies. When children write they use illustrations in the form of cutouts, stickers or drawings to express their ideas and thoughts, hence the nal area of interest is the use of illustrations. In line with content analysis procedures (Krippendorf, 1980), these illustrative forms determined three categories of product, Christmas or closure signature illustrations. Product illustrations included branded and unbranded drawings, cutouts, stickers or
commercial stationery such as Thousand and One Dalmatians notepaper, and Christmas illustrations included individual images or collages of Christmas or family themes. The third illustration theme is the closing signature, which was simply noughts and crosses or the words hugs and kisses. The data are quantitative and qualitative in line with a content analysis where judgment variables transpose to nominal data and appropriate analysis was via chi-square. Other data such as numbers of presents and brands requested is quantitative in nature and analysis via t-test was conducted. Further, chi-square and t-tests are analytical procedures in line with those used in other content analysis of letters to Santa (eg Richardson and Simpson, 1982; Robinson and Morris, 1986; FisherThompson, 1993; Otnes et al., 1994a,b) and were also adopted in this study. In total 422 childrens letters in this study were suitable for analysis of which 173 were written by boys and 249 by girls. RESULTS AND FINDINGS H1 : There will not be a signicant difference between the number of brands requested by boys and girls when children write letters to Santa. Hypothesis 1 (H1 ) was related specically to brand awareness differences between boys and girls. In
Table 2 Communication strategy construct and statement types Persuasive strategy 1 2 3 Politeness Direct requests Compound requests Description Socially accepted forms of ingratiation Appeals that blatantly stated the desire for an item Indirect requests accompanied by qualiers Statement types How are you Please (unaccompanied by request) Thank you I want Bring me/get me/send me I would like Please bring me/get me/send me Can I have/Can you get me Will you get me/bring me/send me
Source: Otnes et al., 1994a
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Figure 1 Joel is certain about the gender appropriateness of one brand and this letter reinforces the view that the child who requested the gift, or brand, assigned the gender appropriateness of the toy or gift request. This letter is also an example of a singularly branded request style strategy. Figure 2 provides an example of letters that examine gender and generic unbranded present and specic branded requests. The results indicate that in the 422 child-authored letters, children
requested 44.8 per cent (787) of the presents for Christmas as branded products. In comparison, Otnes et al. (1994b) reported that 56 per cent (1,278) of 2,475 gift requests were for specic brand names. The average number of gifts requested by boys was 3.9 while girls requested an average of 4.3 gifts per letter, with no signicant difference between the number of gifts requested by boys and girls when they write letters to Santa requesting presents (t 1.17 d.f. 411.15 p 0.243).
Figure 1: Gender appropriateness of requests
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Figure 2: Example of preferred choice
Similarly, a t-test between boys and girls at the brand level also indicated no statistical difference (t 0.07 d.f. 390.46 p 0.942), with both boys and girls requesting 1.9 branded gifts per letter. Therefore H1 is supported in that there was no signicant difference between the number of brands requested by boys and girls when children write letters to Santa. Table 3 indicates the patterns of request by children and their brand orientations. Perusal of the letters in the study also identied that letters to Santa written by children often indicate preferred choices. For example, Figure 2 indicates
that not all requests will be successful and a strategy of identifying priority requests is important. H2 : There will not be a signicant difference between the politeness of girls gift request strategy and boys gift request strategy. Hypothesis 2 (H2 ) suggested that there is no signicant difference between the politeness of boys and girls gift request strategy when children write the letters. Traits of politeness in both verbal and written strategies cover the affective appeals of friendship and simple pleas,
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Table 3 Patterns of requests by gender of authors Request style Brand obsessed Only one brand and no other gifts mentioned Singularly branded One brand mentioned along with other nonbranded gifts Brand majority One brand mentioned more than other brands Pluralistic Two or more brands mentioned equally No brand mentioned Total Percentage Boy 32 26 20 47 48 173 41.0 Girl 33 53 32 60 71 249 59.0 Total 65 79 52 107 119 422 (%) 15.4 18.7 12.3 25.4 28.2 100.0
as well as the buddy style of written strategy. The politeness concept includes three elementary phrases of how are you; please; and thank you in both verbal and written communications strategies. In Figure 3 Milindee asks Santa how are you? and uses the word please. Apart from requests for gifts, a single letter may contain direct, indirect and polite elements as semantic phrases as well as Christmas, product and signature graphics and Table 4 presents the distribution of request strategies and illustrations by authorship of letters. The use of politeness as a major communications strategy occurred in 116 or 27.5 per cent of letters written by children and indicates children did not embrace a politeness strategy. There was an expectation that both boys and girls will embrace politeness similarly. Within the children authorship category, 36 boys and 80 girls used a politeness strategy and the results indicate a statistical difference in favour of girls (chi-square 6.71, d.f. p , 0.01). The hypothesis that there is no signicant difference between the politeness of girls and boys is not supported. By comparison, Otnes et al. (1994) reported 36 boys and 57 girls used politeness elements in their letters and the difference approached statistical signicance. H3 : The letters girls write for themselves will contain signicantly more
indirect request strategies than letters boys write for themselves. Hypothesis 3 (H3 ) suggests the letters girls write for themselves contain signicantly more indirect request strategies than letters boys write for themselves. Use of indirect statements is evident in 75.6 per cent of the letters, of which there were 115 (66.5 per cent) boys and 204 (81.9 per cent) girls. The difference between boys and girls use of indirect phrases is signicant (chisquare 13.05, p , 0.01) and does not support Otnes et al. (1994) who reported no signicant difference between the number of girls and boys using indirect requests. The ndings show children act more in line with the nominal verbal communication strategies (Weiss and Sachs, 1991) that attribute the use of challenge or reason to boys and the simple expectation of having requests honoured to girls. Overall, girls use a request format of statements offered in the simple expectation of having requests honoured. The communication strategy construct places questionstyle statements like Will you bring me, can I have or please bring me as indirect requests. The letter from Melissa (Figure 4) not only illustrates the use of the indirect phrase, I would like, it also demonstrates the polite use of please and the understanding that a choice from presents is expected. On the other hand, boys follow the
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Figure 3: Politeness concept illustrated
Table 4 Distribution of requests strategies by gender Author Boys Girls Signicance of difference Politeness 36 80 chi-squared 6.71, p , 0.01 Indirect requests 115 204 chi-squared 13.05, p , 0.001
strategy of rules, fair play and predominantly use the art of reason and direct challenge. Their communication consists of indirect strategies but also direct phrases like I want or bring me. Figure 5 shows Toms use of the strong phrase I want and does not use any element of politeness.
Additionally, there is an observation about the use of direct phrases in letters that if girls use more indirect strategies than boys do, then boys should be expected to make more use of direct strategies than girls. Only 22 boys and 19 girls letters made use of direct statement phrases such as I want or
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Figure 4: Indirect communication girl
Figure 5: Direct communication boy
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bring me, and there is no signicant difference between girls and boys usage of direct phrases. One possibility for minimal use of direct statements is that there is no immediate response or clarication of meaning as there is in speech and children understand the differences. Support is found for H3 , however, because letters that girls write for themselves contain signicantly more indirect requests than do boys letters. H4 : There will not be a signicant difference between the numbers of illustrations contained in girls and boys letters to Santa. When children write, they not only use lists but also use illustrations in the form of cutouts, stickers or drawings as an examination method to express their ideas and thoughts. Of the 181 letters to Santa that contain illustrations 42.9 per cent of the letters were written by children and there is no signicant difference between boys and girls overall use of illustrations, as indicated in Table 5. The analysis indicates no signicant difference between boys and girls use of Christmas illustrations, however, boys use product illustrations more (chi-square 5.64, p , 0.05). Signature graphics also represents an affective appeal of friendship and an element of girls socialisation, and the results indicate girls use this illustrative format more than boys do (chi-square 18.05, p , 0.001). Despite the differences within the illustration construct, H4 is supported because there is not a signicant difference between the overall numbers of illustrations
contained in girls and boys letters to Santa.
DISCUSSION Christmas is many things to many people and the one aspect that must interest academic and general practitioners of marketing is the impact of brand names on request behaviour of children. Brand requests are a component of the overall gift request behaviour and the purpose of this research is to examine childrens brand identication and request styles at Christmas together with their written forms of communication. Past studies have focused on very subjective, product category-based constructs that make longitudinal comparisons untenable and the category denitions are problematic because of the use of different criteria to describe categories. As an example, Richardson and Simpson (1982) delineate specic categories of machines (models of work and construction equipment such as caterpillars), race cars and vehicles (representations of vehicles for carrying people or goods, eg cars, trucks). There is also a category for depots (places to store vehicles, eg garages, airports, space stations etc.). On the other hand Fisher-Thompson (1993), categorises these machines, race cars, vehicles and depots under the singular category of toy vehicles and includes other items such as trains and planes. FisherThompson (1993), however, places farm equipment and barns in the category of farm and zoo animals, while Richardson and Simpson (1982) indicate toy animals consist of representational animals and
Table 5 Distribution of illustrations Illustration element Christmas illustrations Signature graphics Product illustrations Boy 43 14 17 Girl 65 58 10 Signicance of difference N.S.D. chi-square 18.05, df. 1, p , 0.001 chi-square 5.64, df. 1, p , 0.05
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makes no mention of farm machinery and farm storage toys. Ultimately, a specic product or category could emerge, fade or fail as it moves through the product life cycle. Fisher-Thompson (1993) included categories of furnishings, clothing and accessories, computer and videos that are not included in, or available to earlier studies (Richardson and Simpson, 1982; Robinson and Morris, 1986). The nature of brands is such that, while they are subject to similar cyclical changes, they are a unique entity and identier of specic products within categories. As an example, the Star Wars brand encompasses not just gures, space ships and space stations but is now a recognised brand in diverse categories such as confectionery, stationery, household linen and computer games, whereas the Barbie brand extends to magazines and a pop group. There is a multitude of subcategories within the broader category of toys, which are also a subcategory of Christmas requests. Therefore, brands are important and any research that seeks information on brand awareness and the prevalence of brand usage within the domain of childrens products is valuable. The rationale behind this stance is that a specic product or brand name request may not span time or location. What constituted a popular toy, or brand, in 1985 in America is not necessarily available in 2000 in Australia but the notion of using numbers of brand requests and the request strategy style remain immutable. The availability of particular brands in the marketplace at a given time will not affect the brand request theme of single brand, multiple brands and non-branded requests which are elements that are readily observable and measurable within in the Christmas request category and thereby, enable comparisons in the future. This study has focused on important issues relating to marketing of toys and
the ndings contribute to the understanding of brand request behaviour of adults and children at Christmas. It is quite illuminating to see the clarity with which children can identify specic brands and the method of manipulating the brands in their written letters. Australian children are not unlike the American children that Otnes et al. (1994) indicated, have a strong awareness of the diversity of brand name goods available to them and the knowledge to use brand names and brand extensions in their request behaviour. Because children have a predisposition toward toys and their brands they possess the capability to practise either differentiation between brands or understand that brands can appear in different forms or categories. Children can clearly identify their preferred brand of toy and appear to understand the importance of explicitly requesting such brand names via clearly articulated request strategies. LIMITATIONS As is often the case with consumer research there are limitations, and while this study posed questions concerning the brand awareness and request styles of children and provided some answers to them, it does have some limitations that must be clearly expressed. This study is consistent with previous content analysis of letters written to Santa where the scope of analysis is limited to variables concerning the gender, requests and authorship content of the letters. Children of different ages would clearly have different brand experience levels which affect their brand nomination or usage, however, as in previous studies of this type, the age of the child is rarely cited in letters and absence of an age variable limited the scope of this study. Children may request different presents from different family members, as well as from Santa, and make use of a number of semantic phrases and request strategies. Therefore, the request behaviour
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exhibited in this study is representative only of that population of children who write letters to Santa in Australia and are not generalisable outside the Australian Christmas period. IMPLICATIONS This study shows there is a difference between boys and girls request behaviour and infers a low brand awareness and usage by adults in their request behaviour. The trend in marketing to children has seen their role move from one of demanders or inuencers to important decision makers. Since brand owners seek growth of their brands in other product categories via brand extensions, that brand leaves the exclusive domain of the childrens market and moves into an adult-dominated market. If adults do not recognise, approve or trust the brand, then how can the brand transfer successfully to other categories without additional costs in the establishment of a position and image in this adult realm. Therefore, brand owners and advertisers of childrens brands must encourage adults to form a positive attitude toward the brand by use of a different promotional mix. FUTURE RESEARCH While this study has identied key issues relating to the brand awareness and request styles of children in letters to Santa, it also raises many related questions in need of future research which could be directed to understand what brands mean to children and to adults. Ideally, research could move from a childrens request focus to encompass assessment of parents attitude toward Christmas and the relationship with giving popular brand names as gifts to their children. In a similar vein, the relevance of giving both gifts and brands may also affect the appeal of brand as gifts and the usage of information sources by adults merits attention. The authors investigated the use of
written semantic phrases and some related socialisation issues evident in letters to Santa and suggest that other issues could address how parents communicate with their children about requests and the relationship between this communication and a parents evaluation of brands or use of information sources. Similarly, parents give gifts for different reasons and examination of the connection between these motives or roles and a parents attitude toward Christmas is appropriate. Research could also focus on learning and memory issues in Christmas gift request behaviour by adults and children, eg on the extent to which childrens requests are born from a long-term desire for the brand or are contingent on promotional activities as Christmas draws closer. Comparisons of the Christmas studies indicate boys made more requests in one study, girls in the other. Otnes et al. (1994b) suggest childrens exposure to the environment around them and their understanding of the relative nancial wellbeing of their parents may reect in numbers of presents requested, and in the use of brands. Therefore, a time series study could prove valuable in identifying any variations of behaviour as the same population grows and qualify possible external factors that may inuence Christmas request behaviour. Similarly, a cross-national or multicultural study would seek to qualify cultural differences, while a study that addresses segmentation by cultural background would provide an understanding of request behaviours in minority groups. CONCLUSION This study demonstrates that Australian children do not just request brands as gifts but requesting no brands is a feature of childrens request behaviour that probably reects the tradition of requesting teddies, trucks or dollies along with those semantic phrases and
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expressions that are bound in the Christmas wish list. Further, these young and budding consumers appear to be savvy to the importance of identifying clearly their desired brands because they are highly brand aware and understand that many brands exist, and different toy variants exist within a common brand name. Importantly, they seem to learn how to be successful through request strategies as Robinson and Morris (1986) indicate, children overtly request half of the gifts that are given at Christmas. The focus on brand names within the context of Christmas indicates that toy manufacturers and retailers who heavily promote not only their toys at Christmas, but also the Christmas myth and symbolism of giving their toys as gifts are gaining a competitive advantage. Perhaps many marketers and toy companies are getting their own Christmas wishes answered, via these budding, young, articulate, brand savvy, mini consumers.
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Dear Santa, do you have my brand?

These words are from a favourite Australian Christmas song a

Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 2, 1, 3753 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817

Aron OCass and Peter Clarke

Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 2, 1, 3753 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817