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Barbie the Vlogger

While checking Facebook the other day, I came across a new video from Barbie's Youtube channel. 

Launching in 2015, Barbie's vlogging videos opened up another dimension of the famous Mattel doll to children who were already seeing some of their heroes creating content on Youtube. Recently, however, Barbie has put out some content focusing on women empowerment, an important message for many of the young girls playing with Barbie dolls and tuning into her channel.

The most recent video I saw was on what Barbie calls "The Dream Gap." In her vlog, Barbie comments on young women not pursuing their dreams or being discouraged from doing so by society.

After a bit more research, I learned that Mattel launched The Dream Gap Project in 2018. This campaign aims to better empower the young girls playing with their products and show them that if Barbie is capable of doing anything. 

We're all aware of Barbie's numerous careers. From president to teachers, soccer player to paleontologist, she's done it all. Mattel hopes to spark that same sense of "can do" attitude in consumers buying up their products. 

Aside from activism and female empowerment, though, this is probably a smart and game-changing idea for Mattel. Not everyone is on board with Barbie and there's been a lot of backlash saying that she promotes an unhealthy body image for young girls since the product was released in 1959. I think this Dream Gap Project really attempts to show people that Barbie is more than her image and that Mattel is trying to expand their brand in a positive way.

Either way, Barbie has taken Youtube by storm and has done it while addressing very real and hot topics. If you haven't seen it, check out the full Youtube video here.

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