Tween Magazines

Written for young children between the ages of 8 and 14, “tween” magazines are produced by magazine publishers seeking to extend their marketing, advertising, and branding to children in this age bracket, part of a demographic whose size and disposable income have earned them the “tween” moniker. Representing $10.1 billion in the United States alone, this industry is the fastest-growing global [Page 402]market, including the United Kingdom, Australia, and Korea (according to http://Just-Style.com). In addition to using their own disposable income, tweens use their “pestering power” to influence household purchases of products such as toys, clothing, and food. Because tweens are increasingly accessible through mobile phones, the Internet, and magazines, media companies have strategically recast their nets to profit from this emerging demographic.

In the quest to materialize earnings, tween magazines strive to inculcate a new breed of teenage and young adult consumers through targeted media content. While magazines produced for this youth market reach both sexes with stories about pop stars, music, sports, and entertainment, girls are a highly sought-after demographic. According to an article in the May 28, 2007, online edition of the New York Times, by Elizabeth Olson, among the most popular commercial magazines targeting girls ages 8–14 in the United States are J-14, M, and Nickelodeon Magazine, with roughly 30 percent of preteens reading or looking at each. Disney and Nickelodeon are the dominant media companies that drive the tween magazine market. By marketing young stars across their media channels and outlets through a strategy known as synergy, these media companies have been credited with bolstering the success of other popular tween magazines, including Twist, Tiger Beat, Bop, and Popstar. Disney-created stars, such as Zac Efron and Corbin Bleu from the 2006 movie High School Musical and Miley Cyrus from the television series Hannah Montana, have helped boost the circulation of tween magazines by as much as 25 percent.

Young girls are regarded by the tween magazine industry as a key segment of the economy and powerful market for advertisers seeking to develop brand loyalty. Using an economic formula similar to other popular girl magazines, such as Seventeen, tween magazines feature stories about pop stars, dating, and growing up to lure readers to polling quizzes and advertisements for beauty and fashion. Tween magazines have proliferated, in part, because they allow clothing companies to profit from girls seeking to look older than they are. By exposing girls to the realm of beauty and fashion at a young age, the industry believes that they can create a desire among girls to consume new products to improve their image, leading to future narcissistic tendencies that can be exploited well beyond the teenage years.

Debate about tween magazines centers around whether young girls are becoming empowered by their content or whether reading these magazines encourages them to act and dress older than their age, taking advantage of their developing and impressionable minds.

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Publishers of commercial tween magazines contend that their business empowers young girls, through reading age-related content, to make their own independent choices in social activities, entertainment, quizzes, and contests. Coining phrases such as “girl power,” proponents claim to have founded the industry so that young girls can have a place of their own within the culture, allowing them to relate to issues and topics that they find interesting as they grow up. Likewise, the fashion industry defends tween magazines as allowing girls to make their own clothing choices and other purchases by offering them miniature versions of items targeted to older girls and women.

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