DrinkWise has placed a major focus on parents’ roles as influencers and role models in their children’s lives when it comes to their future consumption of alcohol. We know that parents, through their own attitudes and drinking behaviour, have the power to positively influence their children’s future drinking behaviour – even from a very early age.
The DrinkWise Parental Influence campaigns have enabled parents to become more conscious about the role they play in the education, attitudes and behaviours their children exhibit around alcohol. By positioning parents as role models and influencers in their children’s lives, the DrinkWise campaigns have held a mirror up to parents’ behaviours, allowing them to make responsible decisions in terms of alcohol supply and consumption around kids.
Ongoing education is critical and DrinkWise is committed to working with parents to help look after the next generation.
It’s okay to say nay
The 2022 DrinkWise It’s okay to say nay campaign aims to educate parents of the important role they play in setting boundaries around alcohol and that the overwhelming majority of parents don’t supply their teens with alcohol. The campaign highlights the decisions many parents face when talking to their teens about alcohol and reassures them that they can be confident in the fact that the overwhelming majority of parents don’t supply their underage teens with alcohol and that setting strong boundaries is helping their kids make the smart choice.
Kids absorb your drinking
Launched in 2008, the Kids Absorb Your Drinking campaign marked DrinkWise’s initial step towards bringing about generational change in attitudes to alcohol. The campaign highlighted the strong positive correlation between the way parents drink and how their children grow up to drink. The key to this campaign was ‘holding up a mirror’ to parents’ drinking, to increase their awareness of the effects of role modelling and to positively influence their children’s future drinking behaviour. The campaign sought to start conversations about this issue among spouses, family and friends – well before their own children started experimenting with alcohol. The Kids Absorb Your Drinking campaign included a major television commercial supported by outdoor, digital and consumer information.
Kids and alcohol don’t mix
Developed in 2009, Kids and alcohol don’t mix encouraged parents to delay their child’s introduction to alcohol. DrinkWise recognised that for many parents talking to their kids about alcohol and setting clear boundaries and expectations was a daunting task. The campaign aimed to challenge the belief that parents should introduce alcohol to their child as a way of socialising them to this adult activity. This often meant by allowing them to start
drinking during their teenage years in the family home. The campaign captured a common scenario that occurs in the family home when teenagers ask if they can ‘have a drink’, and sought to encourage parents to agree on a strategy for talking to their kids about why delaying the introduction of alcohol is important.
DrinkWise in front of your kids
DrinkWise in front of your kids, once again held up the mirror for parents to reflect on their own drinking behaviours and how that might be shaping their children’s attitude to alcohol and future drinking behaviour. It encouraged parents to reflect on the way they drink in front of their children and the importance of positive role modelling. The DrinkWise in front of your kids messages featured on more than 600 outdoor signs nationwide.
DrinkWise - Kids and Alcohol Don't Mix brochure
