With 3 out of 4 Parents Admitting Their Kids Forget to Brush their Teeth, Kids’ Healthy Mouths Campaign Continues to Encourage Kids to Brush for Two Minutes, Twice a Day

In December, the Ad Council kicked off its first ever video contest with Zooppa, the world’s leading crowd sourced marketing platform for producing creative content. The Kids’ Healthy Mouths contest called on Zooppa’s community of over 27,000 amateur and professional video makers to leverage the existing campaign strategy to create their own videos showing parents trying to give important advice in just two minutes. The final videos were reviewed by creative directors at ad agency Grey New York and the Ad Council.

The Ad Council is pleased to announce the following videos as contest winners:
Eyes on the Ball (Sam Benenati), How To Weed The Garden (Joseph Binetti), Mime (Jason Kraynek), Birds and Bees (Jason Kraynek), Children’s Oral Health Career (Sean Tracy), Big Boy Time (Justin Pinder) and Sharing (Terrence Jones) with Let’s Change the Oil (Cynthia Bravo) and The Talk (Allen Baldwin) as early entry winners.

Created pro bono by Grey New York, the Kids’ Healthy Mouths PSAs stress that while most parenting is difficult to do in two minutes, such as learning how to cook or ride a bike, making sure kids brush for two minutes, twice a day is something a little simpler. The contest winners capture the spirit of the original PSAs and feature a lighthearted look at parenting today. The videos will be highlighted on the Kids Healthy Mouths social pages throughout the month of February.

“This contest and our Kids’ Healthy Mouths campaign celebrate the dedication of parents,” said Ad Council CEO and President Lisa Sherman. “This is one of our most successful campaigns because the message is simple and succinct, and the creative strategy is compelling and fun – while parenting can be challenging, this simple daily task is a bit easier.”

The mouth is the gateway to a person’s overall health, and an unhealthy mouth can be associated with obesity, diabetes and even heart disease. Additionally, while dental disease impacts all children, it disproportionately affects children from low-income families and minorities.

“While National Children’s Dental Health Month is a wonderful reminder that parents should be focusing on their children’s oral health, we want to make sure that caregivers are dedicated to healthy mouths all year round,” said Gary Price, Secretary and CEO of the Dental Trade Alliance Foundation. “We hope that our ongoing initiatives will continue to give parents the encouragement and guidance they need to teach their children lifelong oral health habits.”

In addition to announcing the video contest winners, Kids’ Healthy Mouths has various additional initiatives planned for the month of February including:

• Texting Program Challenge: Kids’ Healthy Mouths invites parents to join their free texting program which further supports the campaign’s main goal of encouraging parents to make sure their children brush their teeth for two minutes, twice a day. Texters can take part in a five-day family brushing challenge this month, and will also receive personalized tips and support. Text TOOTH to 97779 to join.
• Toothsavers App Update: The widely popular mobile app Toothsavers is getting an update this month with three new characters (Alice in Wonderland, Pinocchio, and Rabbit). The new characters will be announced on Kids’ Healthy Mouths social channels. Since its launch, more than 68,400 people have downloaded the app.
• Scholastic Partnership: Kids’ Healthy Mouths has partnered with Scholastic to continue to educate parents and teachers on the importance of brushing. Resources are available at Scholastic.com/HealthyTeeth for caregivers and Scholastic.com/2min2x for teachers where they can download lesson plans, activities, an oral health care book list, oral health care tips in English and Spanish, and a printable oral health poster.

Since the campaign launch in August 2012, media outlets throughout the country have donated more than $78 million to run the PSAs. Additionally, over 1.9 million people have visited the campaign website to learn more about the importance of children’s oral health.

For more information about the Kids’ Healthy Mouths campaign, visit 2min2x.org and follow the campaign’s social media communities on Facebook and Twitter.

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Campaign Partners

The Ad Council
The Ad Council is a private, non-profit organization with a rich history of marshalling volunteer talent from the advertising and media industries to deliver critical messages to the American public. Having produced literally thousands of PSA campaigns addressing the most pressing social issues of the day, the Ad Council has affected, and continues to affect, tremendous positive change by raising awareness, inspiring action and saving lives. To learn more about the Ad Council and its campaigns, visit https://www.adcouncil.org/, like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or view our PSAs on YouTube.

Partnership for Healthy Mouths, Healthy Lives
The Partnership for Healthy Mouths, Healthy Lives is a coalition of more than 35 leading organizations in the field of oral health. The Partnership is committed to improve children’s oral health so that they can develop into healthy, productive adults. The coalition shares the view that no child should be in pain and suffer broader health issues or endure the social stigma and lack of opportunity resulting from untreated dental diseases and conditions. The coalition’s primary mission is to teach parents and caregivers, as well as the children themselves, to take control of their own health through oral disease prevention. A complete list of members of the Partnership can be found here.