Spin, Dora, spin!

Damn, I wish I'd taken "Under 6 Days" in the "When will Nickelodeon and Mattel cave" office pool.

As I noted last Wednesday, news was zooming through the preschoolosphere about how Dora the Explorer was scheduled for an overhaul, scrapping the elements that kids like my niece have grown to love. The response to the plan and the silhouettes of the new Dora were, well, not very well received.

And now, in a feat of PR spin only a centrifuge could love, it turns out that despite prior news reports, product announcements, etc., the new Dora is actually just an extension of the product line aimed at older kids with the silhouettes representative of a new interactive doll. Really, nobody is messing with classic Dora. Oops!

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In all honesty, I don't think this was a complete reversal like Tropicana and its juice cartons or New Coke. I expect that this was probably the original plan. However, speaking as a marketing and PR person, someone really dropped the ball here in getting the message out effectively -- failing to explain that the silhouettes were those of a doll, stressing even more emphatically that classic Dora wasn't changing, etc. -- thereby running the risk of damaging a billion dollar brand. Instead they've caused an uproar and have to go out to the public to do damage control. On the other hand, their PR efforts got people talking about Dora and people like me, who really don't care about the character, to write about it and you know what they say about publicity, good or bad.

Yeah but will my niece recognize her?

For those of you who are parents of young kids, I expect I'm probably a little late to this particular dance but I heard today that Dora the Explorer is getting a makeover. Nickelodeon, together with Hasbro, are overhauling the look of the backpack-wearing, bilingual explorer and making her...well...girly, based on the two silhouettes have been released:


This is apparently intended to extend Dora's appeal beyond kids like my 3-year old niece and into the 9-11 year old crowd. Gone, it seems, are the backpack, the practical sneakers, the shorts that are perfect for climbing on rocks, the functional haircut, and the chubby body of a little kid in favor of what look like ballet slippers with bows, a skirt, long hair, Barbie legs, and middle school.

This strikes me as wrong on so many levels. Are they just doing this to sell more t-shirts and dolls and backpacks, like an NFL team changing its logo? Do they really think that a 10-year old is going to latch on to this new Dora? And seriously, what's wrong with presenting an image of a girl who wears shorts and plays baseball and soccer? And what about Dora's real fan base...is my niece going to recognize her?

Do these people have no understanding of branding? Didn't they learn anything from New Coke or the Tropicana orange juice debacle that recently ended with a humbled return to the old box? Any bets on the over/under until Nickelodeon and Mattel turn on the way-back machine and bring back original Dora?

If they want to reach an older crowd, just give Dora an older sister for crying out loud. Ladies and gentlemen...Nora the Superficial Bratz Knockoff.