Lights, toddler, burp! Meet Ireland's tot models ...
More and more parents want to see their children on screen, says Chrissie Russell
Related Articles
Monday November 09 2009
So you've welcomed your beautiful new baby into the world, and strangers are stopping you on the street to tell you how cute your little bundle of joy looks. And your friends all coo that Junior should be on TV. And you think: why not?
But where do you start? These days, baby modelling is big business. Every year over €3bn worth of products are advertised by babies. Modelling agencies are ever ready to snap up infant stars even before they exit the womb. And, because most parents feel their little angel is destined to be an asset to any advert, there are plenty of hopeful faces looking to get set up.
But it's a cut-throat industry. Only a handful of baby model applicants get to be regular features on the casting circuit and it's no wonder that books such as Sibylla Nash's Baby Modelling and Beyond: From the Stroller to the Red Carpet and Kelly Keenan's My Kid Should Be Famous are snapped up as vital resources to help parents hone their newborn's talent, appearance and availability.
The baby modelling bug in Ireland hasn't reached the same fevered peak as in the US and UK, but it's starting to take off.
According to Vincent Lambe, director of Young Artists Management in Dublin, there's been a marked increase in enquiries from parents of babies seeking stardom.
He says: "We've had more applications from parents of babies this year than any other. Normally it's about 500 to 600 but at our latest application drive we had more than 1,000."
"We get more enquiries for the under-three age range than any other category," says Vincent. "Unfortunately that's probably the age group with the least work potential -- compared to the UK, there is only a small demand for baby models in Ireland."
The lack of demand is because the big baby brands, such as Pampers, Huggies or Mothercare, are primarily based outside Ireland and tend to source their stars locally.
But a baby on set doesn't always make for an easy shoot. They can only work for short periods of time, so often four or five 'back-up' babies need to be kept in the wings to take over from the first choice 'hero baby' if a performance is below par. A guardian needs to be on set, and as one mum writing on a parenting forum explains, things don't always go to plan.
She writes: "My daughter landed her first modelling job for a jewellery catalogue. She was placed naked on a luxurious pink silk couch and straight away I thought 'baby on silk, not a good idea.' The stylist draped a white satin blanket over the couch and turned to me for reassurance that my daughter wouldn't 'go' while lying there, but minutes later a dark puddle spread across the blanket. Pandemonium broke out."
Such scenarios perhaps account for the attitude of some ad makers: if the product doesn't need a baby, don't get one.
"When it comes to producing TV commercials, there's an old adage in the business that says never work with children or animals as both groups tend to ignore the director's instructions," laughs Joe Clancy from Y&R Advertising Ireland.
He adds: "But I don't think the lack of babies featured in ads is necessarily down to a pre-conceived view by the ad agency for or against using children or babies in TV ads -- if it is relevant to the storyline, creates greater empathy with the target audience and helps communicate the message, then it will certainly be considered."
Typically, babies will earn around €200 for an editorial advert and €1,000 for a television commercial. There's no rigorous audition process facing them either. Vincent explains: "A lot of commercial clients seem to be of the opinion that all babies are fairly similar, so they generally don't mind too much about what the baby looks like -- so long as they would be comfortable and generally happy on a set.
"But babies are always the lowest paid," he adds. " The older they get, the more money there is for the role.
"There are one or two commercials filmed every week in Ireland that require children, but the biggest demand is for children aged between seven and 15. They can expect to make double what a baby will earn. It can add up to a tidy amount, but there are no guarantees, so it's not something any parent should be relying on as their prime source of income."
- Chrissie Russell
Irish Independent
