Barbie, A Story of Brand Reinvention

Mar 11

By Miriam Clifford

What strategy helped Barbie create a new vision for the future? Let’s talk about Barbie.

Barbie is Mattel’s largest, most profitable line, and re-emerged during the pandemic with renewed growth. Since Barbie’s introduction in 1959 in the NY Toy Fair, the iconic doll has captured key pop culture moments, like the space walk, fashion, celebrity & art partnerships with Andy Warhol, Vogue, and NY Fashion week.* Barbie has stellar record of building global brand awareness for its products, with brand awareness of 99%. Barbie is sold in 150 countries, across 40 categories. Yet, Barbie’s alignment & marketing strategies suffered as changes lagged behind trends. From Barbie, we can learn a lesson in brand reinvention.

Despite redesigns, from 2014 -2018, Barbie faced significant challenges, losing its licensing with Disney at a cost of $722M. The brand suffered from reduced consumer sales & declining interest as it was slow to respond to market changes.

“We took Disney for granted. We weren’t focusing on them. Shame on us” -

-Mattel quoted in Forbes 2014

From 2016-present, despite these challenges, Mattel continued to realign Barbie’s marketing strategy efforts to focus on empowerment, body diversity, inclusivity, & positive role models. Yet at times, the brand seemed inauthentic or created controversy, such as when Frida Kahlo’s family publicly rejected the use of her image.

In 2020, Barbie was rated as world’s #1 Toy property by NPD group.

Revenue of 1.35B in 2020 (up from 1.16B in 2019). Sales grew as children stayed home during the pandemic, perhaps replacing other types of toys. In 2020, Barbie was at a pivotal moment as brand value remained mostly steady from 2017–2019, but increased significantly as a result of renewed sales. Brand value in 2016 was $571M. Continued investment in new strategies seems to coincide with being prepared for future challenges, opportunities and threats to achieve profitability and continue to increase brand value.

“Demand for barbie grew by 50% [in 2020], It really speaks to the strength and ongoing momentum of the brand.” -Kreiz, Mattel CEO

The brand is celebrated and inspired girls around the world in its 60th year by: “In its 60th year, the Barbie brand is honoring the largest lineup of global female role models and taking the next step to close the Dream Gap by donating to fund like-minded organizations aimed at leveling the playing field for girls through the Mattel Children’s Foundation. Research has shown that starting at age five, girls start doubting their potential, this is the Dream Gap.**”

“For 60 years, Barbie has championed girls, inspired generations to believe through make believe and showed them that they have choices. With more than 200 careers, six runs for president and a trip to the moon before Neil Armstrong, Barbie continues to evolve to be a modern, relevant role model for all ages,” said Lisa McKnight, General Manager and Senior Vice President, Barbie . . . . ”
Barbie was paying attention to consumers and listening carefully to consumers with immense empathy — a golden rule in Market Research development. Barbie conducted a “global survey of more than 15,000 parents in 22 countries conducted by OnePoll in July 2020 showed 91% of parents from 21 different countries rank empathy as a key social skill they would like their child to develop, but only 24% knowing that doll play can help their child develop these skills” (Besbitt et al. 2019). Moving forward, Barbie can assuage fears, through genuine connection, storytelling that connects to diverse audiences, as she did in her VLOG in 2015 to connect and foster empathy around the world.

Despite being unpopular at the time, Barbie was positioned at a pivotal moment for success. Our team realized this after careful analysis of the brand in secondary research, company financials, SWOT analysis, marketing analysis, and consumer surveys completed by the brand.

Barbie benefits from storytelling opportunities. Dolls with completely fleshed out storylines are lackinng. Barnie can strength its brand position to include recent media acquisitions. It weave content more thoughtfully through all product lines, as the brand did with American Girl and Wellie Wishers product lines.

Dolls could be offered to capture consumer interests, trends, specifically in top toy markets such as Japan, China, Europe, Latin America, by consulting country brand experts, to compete with emerging competitors. It could consider licensing or partnerships with other doll manufacturers, to help reduce cost as recently it streamlined operations of manufacturing.

According to a 2019 scientific study on body image & children’s mental health,

“Though the new body types of Barbie are more diverse than the original doll, they remain unrepresentative of the diversity of female body shapes. Considering that female children and adolescents under the age of 19 are the most prone to the negative effects of physique-salient images, it is imperative that research continue to focus on the automatic, cognitive nature of social comparative tendencies when young girls play with specific toys and view other physique-salient media.” -NIH

The study above suggests that:

• Barbie’s introduction of 4 main body types although a step forward, is not enough to capture the true inclusivity, not solving the problems that plagued the original brand position.•

New lines do more to expand, but a further step would simply be to focus less on how the Barbie looks, and more on storyline, perhaps by including a YouTube Link, more accessories like a coloring book or app-based/QR Code story to describe personality and content like a movie. Then, how the doll looks would only be secondary, and kids could focus on her talents, abilities, achievements and strengths.

New product lines and the movie went towards this change. Our team recommended product improvements to Barbie as outlined in product ideas with more complete storylines, incorporating elements of their existing intellectual property. I modeled each product after one of my three daughters, Amada, Lilliana and Emma.

Barbie successfully launched a culturally relevant doll in Japan, by consulting with local experts. Before this, other efforts failed, as they were not culturally aligned. “Barbie’s Journey in Japan (Published 1996).” The New York Times, 2021, www.nytimes.com/1996/12/22/weekinreview/barbie-s-journey-in-japan.html. Accessed 29 June 2021.

In addition, Barbie could create dolls to align with other interests emerging on multimedia, such as fantasy games, superheroes, and DIY content on YouTube.

Barbie continues to expand its product lines to capture authentic diversity, but story lines would further add to its diversity efforts, and create interest in what the doll is doing, versus what she is wearing, or what she looks like to focus on the content, stories and strengths of each individual doll.

In 2015, Mintel predicted that Millennial moms would drive brands to go genderless, and they also prefer dolls with realistic body proportions. Millennial parents want to embrace authentic diversity and inclusion. These product lines would support that goal and grow Barbie’s content line to include all types of characters that allow children to envision themselves in the brand. Companies like Target, a major distributors for toys have declassified gender sections.

“It is mums who decide on leisure activities, ahead of their partners, and they are looking for campaigns not targeted to a specific gender (such as pink for girls, blue for boys), as well as those that avoid stereotypes (e.g. unrealistic body proportions). These parents will embrace genderless science and cooking attractions, and toys like Lammily — a doll alternative to Barbie, with realistic body proportions.”

Barbie began as a rejection of gender norms of the 50’s, yet this history is often forgotten as it made missteps or was slow to follow generational trends. Our insight here was spot on, and the Barbie movie changed all of this by reminding consumers of the brand history, and also making an effort to make changes for reaching different generations.

Our team recommended some key changes to Barbie’s value proposition.

To highlight this history further, Barbie can:

1.Change its primary brand color to bright orange.

Orange reflects openness, inclusion and welcomeness. Barbie can fully emerge as an option for ALL children, regardless of their gender, honoring the company’s past of breaking gender norms to allow children to play as they wish.

2.Barbie can be a vehicle for adventure for kids to explore their world — countries, imaginative lands, outerspace, & the outdoors through stories, and imaginative content such as movies, shows, social interactions, games, books, digital magazines, and virtual & physical toys.

Barbie started with a dream, that continues to live on in people’s hearts through generations.

Barbie represents a toy children can use to create their own vision for themselves in the future.

Today, many adult buyers feel connected to their childhood inspiration & vision of not only playing with Barbie, but achieving & even surpassing the dreams she proposed to them as children.

Mattel’s American Girl Line was successful in creating storylines children felt connected with such as the “Girl of the Year,” books, movies, toys, accessories, apparel & licensing. If Mattel opens a theme park as planned, storylines across product lines will add value, mimicking, but updating the Disney model for connected entertainment.

Works Cited:

Background

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•‌Barbie Annual Report, 2020 Accessed June 20, 2021 at
https://investors.mattel.com/financial-information/annual-reports-proxies

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•McDonnell, Patrick J. “Mattel Has a New Doll: Frida Kahlo Barbie. Descendants of the Artist Want It off the Shelves.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 9 Mar. 2018, www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-mexico-frida-20180308-story.html. Accessed 22 June 2021.

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‌“Barbie.” Barbiemedia.com, 2021, www.barbiemedia.com/news/detail/163.html. Accessed 22 June 2021.

Holland, Brynn. “Barbie through the Ages.” HISTORY, HISTORY, 29 Jan. 2016, www.history.com/news/barbie-through-the-ages. Accessed 22 June 2021.

Kelley, Alexandra. “Mattel Unveils Most Diverse Barbies Ever — with Vitiligo, Hair Loss and Prosthetic Legs.” TheHill, 29 Jan. 2020, thehill.com/changing-america/respect/diversity-inclusion/480445-mattel-unveils-most-diverse-line-yet-models-with. Accessed 28 June 2021.

Mallenbaum, Carly. “Barbie in 2018 and Beyond: How the Doll Is Getting More ‘Inclusive.’” Des Moines Register, USA TODAY, 25 Apr. 2018, www.desmoinesregister.com/story/life/entertainthis/2018/04/25/tiny-shoulders-rethinking-barbie-hulu-documentary-curvy-doll/540663002/. Accessed 28 June 2021.

‌https://www.nytimes.com/1996/12/22/weekinreview/barbie-s-journey-in-japan.html

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Part 2: Re-imaged Branding

•Afdhel Aziz. “Barbie Announces New Study Showing How Doll Play Helps Kids Develop the Essential Skill of Empathy.” Forbes, 21 Oct. 2020, www.forbes.com/sites/afdhelaziz/2020/10/21/barbie-announces-new-study-showing-how-doll-play-helps-kids-develop-the-essential-skill-of-empathy/?sh=7bc3b1ef5bb8. Accessed 22 June 2021.

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•“Barbie’s Journey in Japan (Published 1996).” The New York Times, 2021, www.nytimes.com/1996/12/22/weekinreview/barbie-s-journey-in-japan.html. Accessed 29 June 2021.

•“Barbie Sales Mattel Worldwide 2020 | Statista.” Statista, Statista, 2020, www.statista.com/statistics/370361/gross-sales-of-mattel-s-barbie-brand/#:~:text=In%202020%2C%20Mattel%27s%20Barbie%20brand%20generated%20gross%20sales,the%20year%20before.%20Additional%20information%20on%20Mattel%E2%80%99s%20Barbie. Accessed 28 June 2021.

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•JAKKS: https://www.target.com/p/kitten-catfe-purrista-girls-39-series-1/-/A-76629123; https://www.jakks.com/products/disney-princess/

•Kelley, Alexandra. “Mattel Unveils Most Diverse Barbies Ever — with Vitiligo, Hair Loss and Prosthetic Legs.” TheHill, 29 Jan. 2020, thehill.com/changing-america/respect/diversity-inclusion/480445-mattel-unveils-most-diverse-line-yet-models-with. Accessed 28 June 2021.

•Mallenbaum, Carly. “Barbie in 2018 and Beyond: How the Doll Is Getting More ‘Inclusive.’” Des Moines Register, USA TODAY, 25 Apr. 2018, www.desmoinesregister.com/story/life/entertainthis/2018/04/25/tiny-shoulders-rethinking-barbie-hulu-documentary-curvy-doll/540663002/. Accessed 28 June 2021.

•Nesbitt, Amy, et al. “Barbie’s New Look: Exploring Cognitive Body Representation among Female Children and Adolescents.” PLOS ONE, vol. 14, no. 6, 25 June 2019, p. e0218315, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6592527/, 10.1371/journal.pone.0218315. Accessed 23 June 2021.

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Part 2: Re-imaged Branding

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•“North America Company Shares — Dolls And Accessories.” Passport. Retrieved from https://www-portal-euromonitor-com.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/portal/statisticsevolution/index. Accessed June 22, 2021.

•“North America Market Sizes — Dolls And Accessories.” Passport. Retrieved from https://www-portal-euromonitor-com.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/portal/statisticsevolution/index. Accessed June 22,2021

•“Lilly Tikes — Where To Buy.” MGA Entertainment. https://www.mgae.com/where-to-buy/lilly-tikes/us. Accessed June 22, 2021.

•“Zuru — Products.” Zuru. Retrieved from https://zuru.com/products. Accessed June 23, 2021.

•”Hasbro — Dolls & Plush.” Hasbro. Retrieved from https://shop.hasbro.com/en-us/toys-games?q=((taxonomy.restName%3Adolls-and-plush-toys)). Accessed June 22, 2021.

•“JAKKS-Disney Princess.” JAKKS. Retrieved from https://www.jakks.com/products/disney-princess/. Accessed June 22, 2021.

•“Lottie — All Toys.” Lottie. Retrieved from https://www.lottie.com/collections/all-toys?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIz62O9L648QIVyW1vBB2CNQ32EAAYASAAEgLWfPD_BwE. Accessed June 22, 2021.

Miriam Clifford

Barbie, A Story of Brand Reinvention

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