The director of the Mattel brand, Lisa McKnight and Raja Rajamanar from CMO of Mastercard Variety In the C-Suite panel presented Tuesday by Canva at the Cannes Lions.
During the session, which was moderate by Variety The chief co-publisher, Ramin Setoodeh, McKnight said that Greta Gerwig’s film “Barbie”, which brought in $ 1.4 billion in the world and has become a phenomenon of pop culture, gave the flagship brand of Mattel, 80 years old, and helped “widen the public and the opening for the brand”.
“We are certainly continuing to get involved with fans and parents and young girls who love Barbie, but we have reached a group of women and men who did not know what Barbie did recently,” said McKnight, adding that the brand now capitalizes on this basis of increasing fans of “market life products, games and even more content.”
The executive said that the success of “Barbie” also serves as “The Blueprint” for the next big theatrical version of Mattel, “Masters of the Universe” next June. In terms of expanding the brand’s attraction, McKnight underlined Ken’s new popularity following the performance of Ryan Gosling in Gerwig’s tent.
“Until the film, we would sell about a Ken at 10 barbies and we sometimes call Ken emotion as an accessory,” she joked. The film, she says, “gave it its own identity and a new platform and there is a lot of interest for Ken. In fact, Mattel recently concluded a partnership with LeBron James, who is their new Ken ambassador.” You will see more programs with model models to come soon, “she said.
Rajamannar, meanwhile, joked that Mattel and Mastercard are both “geriatric brands” because they are 80 and 65 respectively, but have noted that their advanced age does not prevent them from innovating and prospering. McKnight and Rajamannar said they had a competitive advantage due to the confidence that their brands have built during these years.
“Mastercard is the 12th most precious brand in the world,” said Rajamannar, citing the 2.7 billion consumers worldwide who have a mastercard. “This is not the age of the brand, but the competition and the current brand in its event, and one of these most important dimensions of the event is confidence, which is so critical for the category of financial services.”
He says that another aspect is a “transparency” and showing “how authentic you are and how motivated you are motivated by the objective … and do not continue to pursue the new shiny underwear, but constantly offering value to consumers in the areas that are important to them, it is how you gain confidence and keep confidence.”
Speaking of speaking to young consumers, Rajamannar said that Mastercard was “forbidden to speak to young consumers because you cannot lend money to a 10 -year -old child, 12 or anything”.
But they aim to hire an audience younger 16 and over, by “trying to identify what these young people are passionate and how can we appear in an organic indigenous way in these spaces”.
Rajamannar said that a region in which young people are really found is Electro Music, so Masterclass now sponsors more than 85 electronic dance music festivals; Another is eSport. “We are the world’s leading brand to have entered Esports Espace, in partnership with Riot Games,” he said, adding that Mastercard also sponsors the world number one, “League of Legends”, among others.
Regarding Mattel, McKnight said they wanted to address children not only, but also to their parents who have purchasing power. For this last demo, the executive said that Mattel is absolutely based on the social and works with a lot of incredible influencers and creators. »»
McKnight said that young parents of today “do not want to hear about the advantages, even the advantages of the development of a brand’s products. They don’t want Fisher-Price to tell them. They want to hear a peer or someone they respect and find the influence.
By comparing social media platforms, McKnight said Mattel was investing more and more with Tiktok. “This channel continues to become incredibly popular,” she said.
The couple also discussed the role of AI in their respective work. At Mastercard, Rajamannar said that AI is “probably the greatest activation” both in “the B2B space and the B2C space”. In the latter, AI helps the company because they “trained their IA engine on each RPF (request for proposals) of the past and the result”, which, in the past, would take the Mastercard sellers “about seven weeks that we call as a zero project, then they begin to work in the supply of products, the price and all this”.
McKnight, on the other hand, said that even if Mattel uses a “heap of different tools”, they are supposed to “accelerate work and productivity” for their “incredibly talented creative teams”.
“Admittedly, at this stage, do not replace this important human talent. And, and again, the creative instinct, really finding a good success with the packaging with many of our products, and the packaging concerns narration,” said McKnight.
In advance on the 80th anniversary of Mattel Bash, McKnight said that the company discussed 80 partners of “different ways to celebrate the game in the world and bring the game to children and different badly served communities”.
She mentioned the range of Ruby Red Anniversary commemorative toys from Mattel who could produce an “emblematic horny hot wheels” or a “barbie in magnificent Roubis red finishes”.
