Spinning off Profits: Ancillary Exploitation and the Power of Retail

Abstract

As Pecora indicates, at the heart of children’s television including preschool television, there is often a very basic conflict of interest. How-ever much broadcasters and producers emphasise the creative integrity, educational value and age-appropriateness of their preschool offerings, there are always suspicions among parents and cultural critics (see Engelhardt, 1986; Kline, 1993; Linn, 2004; Schor, 2004) that these shows are little more than ‘giant toy ads’ (cited in Hayes, 2008: 127) for a wide array of branded merchandise ranging from toys and DVDs to dubious fast-food promotions. These concerns are partly borne out by the wider context of production. Although many preschool programme-makers are strongly committed to and motivated by the needs of the audience, they have to operate within the economic constraints and market dynamics that define the sector as a whole. As the resources to produce television have diminished in a fragmenting market of multiple broadcast platforms, revenues from merchandise licensing have become a vital component of programme funding, paying for current productions and sustaining future output, reinforcing the ‘commodity flow’ of brand images both within and around programming (McAllister and Giglio, 2005).

Creative projects are the result of marketing strategies and children’s imagination is tied into the market economy. Programming evolves not from the rituals of storytelling but rather the imperative of the marketplace. (Pecora, 1998: 59)