Liam Dann: Why are corporates so woke these days?

According to The Warehouse, the toys topping kids’ letters to Santa this year will be family-oriented, sustainable and interactive.

OPINION:

Dear Santa,

I hope you think I’ve been good this year and bring me some nice presents. I don’t care what they are, as long as they are sustainable and family orientated.

Love

Little Timmy

Okay first of all, yes this is a Christmas column. Merry Christmas.

Christmas now officially starts as soon as advertisers have cleared the decks after Halloween and Guy Fawkes, apparently.

The carols have been playing on TV adverts for at least two weeks.

Now the silly season news stories have also started in earnest.

Last week for example we had the first of what will likely be a series of news stories telling us what children want for Christmas.

According to The Warehouse, the toys topping kids’ letters to Santa this year will be family-oriented, sustainable and interactive.

I have my doubts about this. I’ve spent a lot of time around kids - I even was one once.

That sounds suspiciously like woke corporate language rather than genuine ‘letter to Santa’ language.

I’ll concede the interactive bit. Kids do love robotic toys - although usually only until the first set of batteries runs out (some time on Boxing Day).

But family orientated and sustainable?

“Ever since the lockdowns of the past few years, kids are leaning towards toys that encourage them to spend time with family - think board games, puzzles, or building a toy together,” a Warehouse spokesperson said.

Reusable water balloons, a Barbie made from recycled plastic and wooden toys made from FSC-certified timber are among the toys on the Top 10 list.

“I’m sorry daddy, unless I see the FSC certification I won’t be playing with that block set,” said no kid ever.

To be fair, I’m sure The Warehouse is accurately reflecting the kind of demand for toys they are seeing from parents.

And it was a relief to see a few toys on the list that appear to be there based on genuine childish demand.

The brightly coloured Zuru Smashers - with their evil-eyed pirate skull designs and angry light-up dinosaurs - looked the least sustainable and family-friendly, but the most like something a child would actually look forward to finding in their stocking.

Number one on the list - Squishmallows - also appear to have a demand-driven authenticity.

“Squishmallows are one of the most asked-for toys at the moment thanks to the huge presence they have on social media,” The Warehouse said.

Being previously clueless about the Squishmallow craze, I did some research.

They are collectable. There are Squishmallow influencers.

A secondary market has developed and the rarest Squishmallows sell for thousands of dollars.

There’s obviously still far too much cash in the economy. Although surely only the angriest of ex-Reserve Bank staffers would blame Adrian Orr for Squishmallow inflation.

The Squishmallow trend sounds a bit dystopian but actually, these are just soft toys which have made the leap out of the commodity bin of generic squishiness.

It’s a trend that harks back to riot-inducing days of Cabbage Patch Kids, if not all the way back to the Elvis of cuddly toys - the Teddy Bear.

A Squishmallow is probably on your child's wish list for Christmas. Photo / Supplied

I can’t remember how the mania for certain toys spread in pre-internet days. But spread it did, and marketing departments have always been in the thick of it.

It wouldn’t be Christmas without the crass commercialisation of childhood joy and I’m okay with that.

The tone of this year’s Top 10 toy list got me thinking about a bigger question though - why are corporates so woke these days?

Why do they feel that need to pretend that kids are environmentally conscious, family-focused angels?

Perhaps that’s just a reflection of the corporates themselves.

Whether it’s banks, retailers or power companies, corporates would rather present as sustainable, diversity-loving charitable organisations than profit-making businesses.

It’s also clear - particularly in the more polarised US market - that when forced to pick a side in the culture wars, corporates are on team woke.

Nike threw its support behind controversial liberal sports star Colin Kaepernick and adidas was quick to dump the increasingly illiberal rapper Kanye West.

On balance, I think this is a good thing. But as a (sort of) liberal, I would think that.

More interesting is why it’s happening.

I think it’s because corporates are future-focused. They aren’t consulting moral philosophers about these decisions. They are consulting their research divisions.

They are following the numbers. It’s not quite a democracy. At least not the way politics works.

Voting in actual democratic elections (especially in local government) skews towards the values of older people who turn out in much higher numbers.

That keeps conservatives in the game politically.

But corporates care more about who is turning out to spend. Those numbers skew younger - and woker.

Young people are more valuable economic units because they have a longer life span ahead of them as customers.

If that seems unfair we should remember it’s a trend that began with the youthquake of the baby boom and became firmly entrenched when boomers took the corporate reins in the 1980s and 1990s.

So I guess we shouldn’t be surprised by politically correct Christmas lists.

If woke millennial parents want their wooden toys FSC certified and their barbies made of recycled plastic then that’s what kids are going to get.