Does the Alcohol Industry Target Minors?
With the direct shipping issue raging, the battle lines have been drawn. One of the major arguments against direct shipping, (mainly wholesalers and prohibitionist groups), is that the alcohol industry already targets a youthful audience and less regulation would lead to minors buying wine directly. But a new Penn State study takes issue with these alleged efforts to push booze on children.
From 2001 to 2003, Professor Emeritus John Nelson comprehensively searched for economic evidence of this accusation. In the journal, Contemporary Economic Policy, he published his findings from examining the reader demographics of 28 different magazines that ran 3,675 alcohol advertisements.
Professor Nelson’s conclusion is quite stark: “The percentage of youth readers is not significant in any of the economic regressions, regardless of the model. Policymakers would be well advised to turn their attention to other aspects of youth drinking behaviors, rather than decisions made in the market for advertising space.”
In short, he found no evidence that the alcohol industry intentionally targets a youthful demographic. The most popular magazines for advertisements were about subjects including men’s style, sports, entertainment, and music.
According to Nelson, theses are not especially popular subjects for young people and they make up a small percentage of the readership. He goes on to say an intuitive truth: that audience size and ad costs are the true determinants of promotional decisions.
Comments & Reviews
January 6, 2007 | eljefe
If anything the alcoholic beverage industry is bending over forward trying to avoid the appearance.
I dunno about anyone else, but I am offended by these silly birth date dropdowns that you have to manipulate in order to gain access to the forbidden information that Chardonnay pairs well with halibut.
Discouraging our young people from learning about alcohol in a positive way is far more damaging than any targeted advertising would be.
January 7, 2007 | Joe Birtchings
I agree, those age verification splash pages are absurd. First of all, why do they have to protect the whole site. Shouldn't they just verify age before purchase of alcohol. Secondly, do they even work? It doesnt take a geneious to put in any year before '85. For a minor trying to buy alcohol, those splash pages dont provide much of a barrier. Now something that would work would be age verification through credit cards. I dont know what the policy is on that kind of thing, but it seemd like it would work.
January 7, 2007 | eljefe
None of those splash pages work. I take special glee in setting them to the earliest date possible... "OMG he's 105!"
The only thing that works (or is even appropriate) is age verification at time of delivery. That's what we pay UPS $3.50 to do.
January 7, 2007 | Ryan Fujiu
So you're not really 105 eljefe? You've really thrown these wineries for a loop. Soon you'll start seeing marketing campaigns targeted towards 100 year old winos...
January 8, 2007 | eljefe
Well, that's just me celebrating my own paleoflatulence... but there's always hope!
January 8, 2007 | Joe Birtchings
The worst thing about it is that most of the time, the winery website's dont even remember personal information. I'll check the remember box and the next time i go back to the site, i have to put in my birthday again. Its the most annoying thing in the world.
January 9, 2007 | Ryan Fujiu
Joe, i've had similar problems. It seems like there are problems recognizing cookies. They spend tens of thousands of dollars building flash based sites and can't even recognize cookies, definitely amateur hour.
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