Feed Lot Magazine Online, Beef Industry Announces New Youth Marketing Strategies

Kids play an important role in the future of building beef demand, both as current and future customers, a task force of beef industry producer representatives has concluded. As a result of the task force's year-long work, beef checkoff youth programs will take a new direction beginning this fall.

" Beef producers have consistently rated the youth audience among the top three priorities during grassroots surveys," says Trudy Carey, Florida cattle producer and chairman of the Beef Industry Youth Strategic Planning Task Force. "We looked at the beef industry's youth program from every angle and uncovered new information that will make our program even more effective. We need to think of kids in terms of how powerful they are at influencing what foods Moms buy," she says.

Based on its research and deliberations, the task force recommends the following goal for the beef industry's youth program: "Establish positive attitudes towards beef in the targeted youth audience in order to capitalize on children's role as influencers of Moms' food purchases and to build a long term base for product demand."

" We have traditionally thought of kids as being important long-term," says Scott George, a Wyoming cattle producer and chairman of the subcommittee that oversees how checkoff dollars are used to reach the youth audience. "With the beef industry now targeting Moms, this changes the whole ball game when it comes to kids. We all know the influence kids have over what goes in the shopping cart." In fact, kids' influence in the food category amounts to $88 billion a year, including $8 billion in the fresh and packaged meats category, according to youth marketing experts at the Geppetto Group in New York City.

At the core of the beef industry's new youth strategic direction is a first-ever "Youth Positioning" checkoff-funded study. This study, based on interviews with kids, other independent research and advice from youth marketing experts, gives new insight into how kids think about beef, and how they can be motivated to be more positive about it. To be most effective, kids need to think of beef as "what you want to eat when you are having fun with the people you care about most - it tastes super, and helps you look and feel great."

The task force also narrowed the target audience to kids eight to 12 years old - called "tweens" by kid marketers. "At this age, our research indicated, kids are developing life-long eating patterns. While they may take detours during the turbulent teenage and college years, checkoff research indicates that girls seem to revert back to their preteen dietary patterns when they become Moms," says Carey.

Girls will be the primary group targeted in the "tweens" category because they are more likely to accept beef alternatives, have more nutritional concerns, and grow up to be Moms. "Focusing on a specific age group had to be done. Resources are just too limited to reach all kids effectively. Being a 'mile wide and an inch deep' was not what the task force wanted to do," reports Carey.

Relying on the positioning research, the task force recommends a strong nutrition message to girls, and a message that beef is great-tasting. In many ways the girls' marketing message parallels the Moms' marketing message, but in terms kids relate to and understand. Boys will be included in the target audience if funding is available in future years. The task force concluded that boys could be reached most effectively with a message about how great beef tastes.

The task force recommends strategic shifts in the types of youth programs conducted by the beef industry. In addition to continuing previously successful school education programs, the task force urges the beef industry to improve youth program effectiveness by incorporating public relations, collaborations with youth organizations and Internet strategies.

The positioning research reveals that most kids know meat comes from animals; however, most kids also find the connection between the live animal and food to be unappealing. The task force recommends that youth programs avoid emphasizing this connection, and instead increase youth's positive perception of beef as a food. "To create more demand for beef, our message needs to focus on beef as a product to eat, not the beef animal," George said.

The positioning research also shows that kids like beef, but don't think of eating beef - they think of eating hamburgers, tacos, sloppy Joes and steaks.

" We have a great deal of work to do, but we know the direction to take. Checkoff investments to reach the youth audience will be more effective and focused than ever," says Carey.

The Beef Industry Youth Strategic Planning Task Force was formed in 1999, with representation from national and state associations. "Having a unified effort among all national and state organizations is always a high priority, so their representation was important to assure their voices were heard during the process," says Carey.