It’s true most parenting magazines have mom-free names and try to insert a page or two “just for dad,” but the reason the overwhelming amount of content is geared toward the female persuasion has a lot less to do with the editors than it does the people who are paying to get the magazine out the door: the advertisers.
Sorry Dad – but they don’t care if you want five friendly recipes for adding veggies to your kid’s diet. They want to sell your wife/girlfriend a package of organic waffles with broccoli ground up inside. Because the studies show she’s the one more likely to buy them. Women are widely touted as the controllers of the family purse strings – even in families where there are shared checking accounts. The common number you hear? About eighty percent of family spending is done by the female head of household.
Bad news for those of us trying at least to cover the cost of the Pampers by writing about our dad experiences. Until we become a real economic force, dads are an add-on. But why is that when dads are involved, or usually lead, the very big ticket items, like the choice of the mini van or the new long-term life insurance plan.
As I mentioned a few posts back, this year at the ABC Kids show in Vegas, “dad” was integrated into all the marketing materials. Maybe dad isn’t doing the weekly shopping but he is weighing in heavily on which stroller he is willing to push down the street, or which car seat he’s going to move in and out of the car. Dads do think differently than moms, and the sexes will likely continue to have their own sweet spots and obsessions, but count on more and more dads to be making the choice of the family toothpaste and even the diapers as we take a more active role in “home” and even stay there to be with the kids.
