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The sad facts are in: Young people are reading less for fun, which means they are missing out on some of the great works of literature.
And it's no wonder, with all the other ways for kids to entertain themselves, beginning with the internet and video games.
So how do you get kids to read, anyhow?
An agency in New Zealand has come up with one very clever way for its client, the New Zealand Book Council.
Back in November, the DVD was released of “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,” adapted from the classic children's adventure novel by the Irish writer and Oxford don C.S. Lewis, also the author of such noted works as "The Screwtape Letters."
"Chronicles" was a box office hit, so it was no surprise that kids would rush out to video stores to rent the movie.
What was surprising is what they found when they got to the store and peeked into the DVD case. On the left was the DVD. On the right was a page that asked this age-old question: “Is the book better than the movie?”
Turning the page they found the first two chapters of the Lewis novel, as if taken from a book. After the two chapters was a page with the New Zealand Book Council’s logo that encourages kids to keep reading.
The idea came from the book council's agency, Colenso BBDO in Auckland. Lisa Fedyszyn, an art director at Colenso BBDO, says she and creative partner Jonathan McMahon thought of the idea while brainstorming over ways to encourage young people to read more.
“The main competition for books, DVDs, seemed to be the perfect medium to hijack,” Fedyszyn says.
The campaign began in November in video rental stores in Auckland and surrounding areas, and while Fedyszyn says it’s still a bit too early to measure the response, it had all the right elements of a successful alternative media campaign. It reached just the people it needed to reach at just the right moment, and in a way sure to take them by surprise.
And it wasn't expensive.
