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Recently in Salon Mothers Who Think

We obsess, therefore we buy
Parenting manuals multiply along with parental insecurities.
By Karen Karbo
[03/01/00]

Stealth merchandising
Why is the venerable Scholastic book club company peddling cheesy toys in classrooms?
By Shoshana Marchand
[02/29/00]

Hooked on tutoring
After-school programs bleed Mom and Dad while dissing Junior's teachers.
By Catherine Davis
[02/29/00]

Babes in Willy Loman-land
Why does my kid have to sell stuff door-to-door for her school?
By Bob Whitby
[02/29/00]

What kind of mother are you?
Marketing mavens dissect moms for eager advertisers.
By Lisa Moskowitz
[02/28/00]

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If you don't agree with the helmet mom, how can you possibly reply? "No, I want my baby to crack open her skull." It's a trick question. You have to admit to what sounds like criminal neglect -- that you never thought about putting a helmet on your toddler. And even if you feel pretty OK about it, you still may experience a twinge of guilt or paranoia, faced as you are with a more "responsible" parent in possession of the most advanced safety equipment.

Also Today We obsess, therefore we buy Parenting manuals multiply along with parental insecurities. By Karen Karbo   The family for sale We take a week to examine the ravenous commercial forces that prey on us each day.

This guilt and paranoia are the fuel of a multibillion-dollar baby products industry that creates a full range of merchandise for every imaginable safety concern, as well as a full range of products for safety concerns that cannot be imagined. This vast array, sold everywhere parents can be found or followed, causes the beleaguered (or merely cynical) among us to ask: Is this industry assuaging our fear by providing us with useful products? Or is it creating terror for which its products appear to be the only answer?

From a selling standpoint it is a simple marketing equation: How susceptible you are to the natural fears of parenting is directly proportional to how much you are willing to spend. A Fisher-Price baby monitor for $19.95? Or $499.99 for the wireless BabyCam monitor with infrared lens that allows you to hear your baby and see him in the dark?

Safety standards change from decade to decade even when parents' instincts to protect and care for their children remain constant. And the baby products industry has exploded not just by marketing products that enhance and exaggerate our instincts but by responding with gusto to each safety proviso that comes down the pike. The result is that Americans are buying more baby stuff than ever before.

Since 1990 the number of babies born in the United States has declined 8 percent while spending on baby products (excluding diapers, clothes and food) has experienced annual double-digit growth. The Juvenile Products Marketing Association says the industry took in a record $4.86 billion in 1998, up 10 percent from 1997. That's a lot of helmets.

New parents today spend an average of $6,200 during their baby's first 12 months. How much of that is stuff they didn't really need or that is downright useless? According to consumer advocates Alan and Denise Fields, more than a third of the expenditure, or about $2,400, goes for unnecessary products. (The Fields are the authors of "Baby Bargains: Secrets to Saving 20 Percent to 50 Percent on Baby Furniture, Equipment, Clothes, Toys, Maternity Wear and More.")

"There is a lot of pressure on parents from baby retailers, from friends and family, to buy the very best for baby," says Alan Fields. "Some of it plays into age guilt, where instead of being a mom at 22, maybe you're a mom at 38. You've waited a long time for this and, by golly, you're going to do everything right. You also have more money at 38 than you did at 22. So sometimes there's a tendency for older parents to just overdo it."

But they are invited -- urged -- to do it by marketers who solemnly promise: There is no such thing as overdoing it; there is only doing it right. As soon as the pregnancy test is double-checked, parents are beckoned down a never-ending path paved with products, lured there by the marketing double whammy of safety and style.

Mothers are the main targets. Just look at the packaging of any babyproofing product box. Inevitably there is a smiling mom with an inquisitive toddler at her side who is reaching his hand toward the open flame of the stove. But does the mom look worried? No, she looks bemused, peaceful even. She doesn't have to worry about her little peanut pulling down a pot of boiling pasta water on his head. She spent $20 on a stove guard! She can relax and focus on cooking dinner!

So far, we've been lucky in my family, but each baby safety product brings up the question that burns within every new parent: Do I trust myself to supervise my children enough to keep them safe? It can drive you insane to think of all the ways that your children could be hurt once they start moving around the house by themselves. You can understand why some parents buy helmets, padding for all their furniture and locks for everything that opens. And the fact that they do brings up the question: Should I?

Next page | What's wrong with letting your kid take a spill?