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Granted, I don’t know many fourteen or fifteen year-olds that like wine, let alone are obsessed with Hello Kitty … both the former and latter seem to be a sign of an individual who’s 20 or over anyway, but I digress.
Company Innovation Spirits, the creator of the new wine, states that the majority of Hello Kitty fans are older and the product is not even remotely geared toward children, but there are still people up in arms over the marketing of an alcoholic beverage packaged in a “kid-friendly” design. Many dissenters state that the concept is abhorrent; because Hello Kitty is as still relevant today as it was twenty years ago, there are plenty of children who might be into the product line and subsequently, the wine.
Personally, I don’t think it’s a huge deal. Not many youngsters are allowed into liquor stores (… duh) and it’s not as if Hello Kitty’s marketing people are everywhere young people might happen to be, handing out free samples, right?
So, I’m leaving the ball in your court, illustrious readers. Do you think Hello Kitty is overstepping their boundaries in product development or are people overreacting — once again — to something that isn’t really that big of a deal?
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I’m 35 and I own a Hello Kitty humidifier. I’m guessing the target audience is adults.
Well I don’t like wine or hello kitty so I don’t think I’m the target demographic.
I think cute labels do encourage kids to drink though. Most of the time when I see teens drinking it’s something with a cute or funky label. Back when I was a teen it was that cheap champagne-like stuff with the doe on the label, might just be a UK thing. Even in college we picked our wines purely on the labels and names, we’d look at the cheap wines and pick whichever label was most amusing.
My advice to you is to not try and comprehend Japanese branding.
Haha!
To further this sentiment:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcfI0gf9oDc
I’m pretty sure the people that like hello kitty are either 7 or old enough to buy wine. Either way it’s a non-issue.
Yeah, I thought hello kitty was ridiculously dumb even at the age of 7. But Japanese people always have the craziest products and ideas.
Don’t these people have anything better to do with their time than to bitch about how companies market their products?
Minors theoretically cannot buy alcohol.
If minors CAN get their hands on it – does it really matter what the picture is on the label?
I prefer Happy Bunny, myself.
I’d definitely buy Happy Bunny wine, oh yeah.
[...] Okay, normally I’m not one to run around screaming about how pop culture is corrupting today’s youth…but Hello Kitty wine?!? – Zelda Lily [...]
[...] Is Hello Kitty wine sending youth the wrong message? Uh, yes! [Zelda Lily] [...]
When they come out with Hello Kitty fortified Kool Aid, then we need to worry.
Japanese society has a thing for youth. To an extreme. In which adult women are attractive by acting as cute children. This leads to some fucked up things. Like the popularity of Hello Kitty among adults. And therefore its brand on everything, including wine. I’ll bet you can find Hello Kitty condoms in Japan…
Why is that–the obsession with youth? Is it just youthful girls or is it youth for all? I have a hunch that it’s just girls, which makes me want to throw the fuck up.
older unwed japanese women are sometimes called “christmas cake” – meaning they aren’t any good after 25.
that’s some tough social pressure right there. it’s pretty easy to be obsessed with youth under circumstances like that. plus japanese children are generally very indulged, but once childhood is over there are very strict social pressures to do/be/act the right way. i’d get nostalgic for the good old days with a bottle of ‘kitty too.
I have a few friends in that situation – they are not wanted by Japanese men, and are not inclined to look outside the culture as their families would not like it.
I find from working with a great many Japanese girls in various situations that they are kind of trained to act like idiots around men, even when they aren’t.
And I’m pretty good at nailing straight chicks – but have never gotten a Japanese girl. Ever.
I think it’s only the girls/women as (at least as far as I know) men get more respected as ‘wise’ when they get older. I was an intern in an international company a few years back and my boss (he was around 27) had huge problems in Japan, because he was young than the men in the Japanese office (and as he said: “Not silver enough yet…”).
I hate it when women or girls use Hello Kitty. It looks very cute when a little girl is wearing a HK t-shirt, but when I see a 15 or 20 years old girl with a HK hair clip I just want to hit her and tell her, “SWEETHEART grow up, it’s not cute nor cool nor funny, you just look like you have Peter Pan’s syndrome.” Hello Kitty is tacky.
I can, however, see the point on the wine selling, there are loads and loads of women who love it, hence the range of Hello Kitty pyjamas and underwear for adults.
And to think, I was called juvenile the other day for my Super Mario Bros. and Legend of Zelda t-shirts. Which, to be fair, I usually only wear around the house or for pajamas.
AWESOME!!! I want a Mario shirt! I guess I’ll have to settle with my Hogwarts and Grryfindor shirts. :)
HUGE NERDS WITH DORKY MERCHANDISE UNITE!!!
I want a Zelda shirt! that’s absolutely wicked!
I hope one of the ladies tell you it none of your business. If you do not like, don’t look.
PS. if in America: it a free country.
Yeah, so, I was going to give you a coherent answer, but then I saw your blog. And your English level is also pretty dreadful, it makes baby Jesus cry. Oh, and I’m glad America is a free country, I live in Europe. Booooooooooo-yah.
Give 15 year olds a little credit. When I was 15 I had perfected making wine in a home made still under my bed and I used to sell it at school, the profits from which becoming the foundation of my vast and evil empire.
That’s all well and good, but…..I think you’re probably in the minority, Goo. The exception to the rule.
Come on, there is one Ferris in every school. Thats a minority but an influential one.
Nice. When I was 15 people were just buying it from the wee liquor shop run by a tiny old lady who believed every kid who went in to buy booze for their parents. Ironically the area round the back of her shop is still a premier hang out for drinking teenagers despite the fact that the store closed before many of them were even out of diapers.
I guess they forgot about the Hello Kitty vibrators being fun for everyone~
Bitch about the sex toys before the wine (:
I was hoping someone brought that up…
http://www.kittyhell.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/hello-kitty-vibrator-set.thumbnail.JPG
huh? having an orgasm is worse for minors than buying booze? how does that make any sense?
Well it’s not, but obviously Hello Kitty isn’t marketed just to 5 year old girls. I don’t know any 5 year olds who are interested in toasters, or suit case sets. Sanrio markets their brand to a wide age group.
Also, to be perfectly honest, I think this is a knock off product.
[...] Is Hello Kitty Wine Sending Youth the Wrong Message? – Zelda Lily: Feminism in a Bra [...]
[...] Is Hello Kitty Wine Sending Youth the Wrong Message? (26) [...]
Hello kitty really took off!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tZ-4NKOZl8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OYn2Bq4OJY