Disney Star’s ‘Let’s Get Healthy’ project, which promotes healthy living across its Disney channels, is centred on developing interesting narratives and programming to entertain consumers while also reinforcing the idea of living a healthy lifestyle. They have created programmes such as Disney Delicious With IKEA, Delicious Minis and Let’s Get Healthy With Gary.
In order to promote healthy foods and beverages for children, as well as responsible marketing of food to adults, Healthy Living has established nutritional guidelines. Disney’s nutrition standards will apply to all food and beverages advertised, sponsored or promoted in India on Disney Channel, Hungama and Disney Junior. Super Hungama and Disney International HD, as well as Disney owned online destinations that cater to families and children.
In a conversation with exchange4media, Gaurav Banerjee, Head- Content, Disney+ Hotstar & HSM Entertainment Network, shed more light on the initiative and the entertainment network’s endeavours to promote healthy living.
What does healthy living mean to Disney Star?
In India, we launched this initiative under the umbrella of ‘Let’s Get Healthy’ in 2020, and through our kids-targeted destinations, we have been consistently working towards building this initiative across multiple touchpoints, hoping to inspire kids and families to embrace a healthy lifestyle. Our role is to encourage healthy eating habits and exercise for children. Our platforms have been updated with initiatives that show easy, fun ways to integrate healthy living into everyday life.
In addition to engaging initiatives that convey the message of Healthy Living, we have also taken the commitment further by only associating our kids’ brands and characters with a more nutritionally balanced range of foods through advertisements and sponsorships.
Why would an entertainment company venture into the healthcare space?
As a company that engages young fans by telling stories and creating characters, we have a powerful influence and can shape their minds and world. It’s an immense responsibility and we take it very seriously. It was an excellent opportunity for us to play a part in empowering families and kids to make better choices. We want to raise a healthy generation of decision-makers.
We have identified – nutrition, hygiene and physical activity – as focal points that we want to emphasize. Over the past few years, we have advocated these through various iterations of Let’s Get Healthy in India – our successful on-ground initiative called Stay Fit with Mickey and Minnie, animated shorts with Jojo, cooking based shows like Delicious, Delicious Minis, Let’s Get Healthy with Gary and bit-sized quick paced formats like Healthy Hacks across our television and digital platforms.
Which Healthy Living campaign has been the most successful and why?
In India, we have been curating a wide array of initiatives to promote this initiative and take great pride in presenting the communication through a fun, narrative setting that doesn’t interfere with the viewer experience but effectively delivers the message. This journey began with Mickey and Minnie. We launched this initiative through Star Fit with Mickey & Minnie. It has become one of the most successful campaigns for us, reaching 3 million children in schools, and generating over 100 Mn views on social media. We observed that fans embraced Disney Delicious, which has received about 10,000,000 views on social media.
What are your favorite touchpoints to promote Healthy Living?
Storytelling has always been at the heart of what we do, and we ensure that we weave in wholesome, entertaining and enriching messages within a fun, engaging narrative – whether it’s through on-ground or content initiatives spanning long-form or short-form content.
For India specifically, we believed the most effective approach for dissemination was through our strong network of kids’ channels – which today holds a leading position with a 30% network share* along with our social media platforms which have a reach extending to a fan base of 10 Mn+.
What are the industry’s feelings and implications since the nutrition guidelines will be implemented in October 2020?
These efforts have been praised and recognized by parents, nutritionists, federal regulators and advertising professionals around the world. The industry sentiments in India have also been very positive. We see an increasing number brands offering healthier alternatives, and joining our efforts to promote a health lifestyle. We have worked with brands who share our vision and were eager to collaborate with us on this journey.
What impact has this had on your advertising?
Our platforms have helped a variety of healthy products gain traction and recognition through our advertising. Our position as the leader in this genre also attracts brands outside of food and beverage categories that see us as an ideal brand to work with and connect with children and families. Consumer durables, FMCG, Health and Wellness and E-commerce have been consistent categories along with fashion and lifestyle, consumer electronics and FMCG.
Brands understand that the kids’ genre presents an opportunity not only to reach kids but also parents due to significant co-viewing. Moreover, they understand that kids nowadays exert an increasing influence on family decisions and are more discerning and knowledgeable in their choices – hence the advertising overall, hasn’t been as impacted.
After the implementation of these guidelines, did some brands cease advertising with Disney Star?
It’s interesting to note that while we couldn’t continue our association with certain brands’ there have been a lot of brands who have been in dialogue with us to see how they can modify their product composition to work with our guidelines.
What plans do you have to expand the initiative?
Let’s Get Healthy will remain a significant initiative, and this is only the beginning for us. During special occasions like National Nutrition Week, our endeavour is to combine the fun found in Disney’s stories and characters with the enriching message of adopting better and healthier lifestyle choices.