Skechers Wants Your Daughter To Spend Daddy's Money On Heels
Skechers is not known for their subtle design. The mid-priced blinged-out shoes are popular with the young girls. But their recent shoe design, and more importantly their marketing decision, is very sketchy and creating a backlash from parents.
Daddy'$ Money shoes. Get it? The dollar sign is an 'S'. The Daddy'$ Money tagline is: "Get spoiled with Daddy's money, ultra cool shoes that will put you in the spotlight..." They have a two inch heel disguised in a sneaker, and promise to give you an extra two inches. I guess the invisible part is so daddy isn't too upset when you spend his money on inappropriate high heels.
The shoes go by the lovely names of "Gimme Wicked," "Gimme Kisses" and "Gimme Megabucks." These shoes are aimed at the teen and tween market. Check out the video to see how young the girls are while singing "I'm Daddy's Girl."
We know that a two inch heel on a growing girl is a bad idea, even when it is disguised in a sneaker. So there is that. But more insidious is the supposed "lighthearted" marketing. As Lydia says at Rants From Mommyland: "It's so bad that if it were a Saturday Night Live sketch - it would be hilarious. But it's not. It's real."Many parenting writers have criticized Skechers for aiming the product at young girls (12 and under) as well as the message that a girl's job is to manipulate her dad into buying her pretty things. It is reinforcing an old stereotype that daddy's little girls get what they want by dressing sexy and they don't have to work for their own money.
When I first saw Daddy'$ Money, I thought it was about sugar daddies and that it was perpetuating an even more insidious stereotype that high school girls are playthings for rich sugar daddies.
Skechers probably saw the double meaning and liked it. Which is even scarier.
We consumers have choices what to buy, but these commercials were broadcast on channels aimed at kids. So the message about manipulation, about needing new things and about not being good enough was being sent out to all who was watching.
When I went on the Daddy'$ Money blog, I had hoped to see an explanation from Skechers (no matter how lame) about the marketing campaign. But no, just pictures of young girls in clothing that was too old for them.
Skechers did respond to some of the criticism by saying: "The Daddy’$ Money name and the collection’s advertising are designed to be fun and lighthearted, and we regret that some people have been offended by the name," the company said.
I'm not just offended by the name, but by the whole kit and caboodle of high heels for girls, trashy marketing, sexualized tweens. Skechers may not care what I think since I don't have daddy's money to spend on their company. But luckily, I have my own. My daughter will be in Converse until she has her own money to spend.
What do you think?
Want more chaos? Last year, I wrote about the best games to beat March Break boredom.
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