Using TV addiction to educate children. Sesame Street broke boundries and changed rules to bring education to every child.

Dave Young:

Welcome to the Empire Builders Podcast, teaching business owners the not-so-secret techniques that took famous businesses from mom and pop to major brands. Stephen Semple is a marketing consultant, story collector, and storyteller. I’m Stephen’s sidekick and business partner, Dave Young. Before we get into today’s episode, a word from our sponsor, which is… Well, it’s us, but we’re highlighting ads we’ve written and produced for our clients. So here’s one of those.

[Seaside Plumbing Ad]

Dave Young:

Welcome back to the Empire Builders Podcast, the podcast where Stephen Semple and Dave Young, that’s me, Stephen Semple is him, we talk about businesses and how they grew and what made them empires. And normally during our little countdown to the recording, Stephen hands me the topic. He whispers in my ear what we’re going to talk about today, and he didn’t do that. So I still have no idea, but my enthusiasm is high because before we started recording, he said, “I’ve got some really good ones that we’re going to record today.” I’m thinking, “Finally. Finally, some good…” No, I just, they’re all good. But you’ve got me on the edge of my seat, Stephen. You said I would be able to get this without the timer, without the countdown.

Stephen Semple:

That’s it. So it starts off this way, “Can you tell me how to get, how to get to…”

Dave Young:

Sesame Street? I can sing it.

Stephen Semple:

Yes, that’s it. Well, I could sing it as well, but no one wants to hear me sing.

Dave Young:

Sunny day, dah, dah, dah. Oh, yeah. Oh, Sesame Street.

Stephen Semple:

Yes.

Dave Young:

Cool.

Stephen Semple:

Yes. We’re going to talk about Sesame Street. Now-

Dave Young:

Are we going to do voices?

Stephen Semple:

You might be able to.

Dave Young:

Here’s the countdown, 5, 4… Four countdowns. Three. I don’t think The Count did countdowns, did he?

Stephen Semple:

No, he never did, I don’t think. But it’s a nonprofit. It’s owned by a nonprofit.

Dave Young:

[inaudible 00:02:59].

Stephen Semple:

But a 1996 survey found that 95% of all American preschoolers had watched it by the time they were three years old.

Dave Young:

Sure. I believe that.

Stephen Semple:

Ninety-five percent. Now, when you hit a number like that, holy crap. I started looking at some of these things and went, “This is a story that we’ve got to explore.” So Sesame Street first aired on November 10th, 1969 on Public Television. And put in perspective, that’s the year that a man landed on the moon. That’s what we’re going back to.

Dave Young:

So here’s the funny thing, I wasn’t even a preschooler. I was six. I’d watch it today if it was still on.

Stephen Semple:

It’s amazing.

Dave Young:

All the Spanish I know came from Sesame Street.

Stephen Semple:

There you go.

Dave Young:

I can count to 10.

Stephen Semple:

There you go. Amazing, eh?

Dave Young:

Yeah. So 1969…

Stephen Semple:

It changed television. And it’s estimated that it’s contributed to the education of over 150 million kids. It’s the home of Elmo, and Tickle Me Elmo is one of the best-selling toys of all time, and all this was created and owned by a nonprofit. And the creators were Joan Cooney, Lloyd Morrisett, and of course, Jim Henson was a big contributor in the early days. And Joan was a documentary TV producer for Public Television. And the story basically starts in 1966, and Joan Cooney had just completed a documentary on a school in Harlem that was trying to close the gap in results with white counterparts.

And if you think about it, in the mid-1960s, a lot is happening. The Civil Rights Movement is in full swing, but there’s still this big gap. And Black first-graders are scoring lower on tests than 85% of white kids. There’s this definite gap, and this leaves them a full grade level behind by age six in terms of education standards. So Lloyd is a friend of theirs, and he’s a child psychologist, and he’s also the VP of the Carnegie Corporation, which is a nonprofit dedicated to learning. And basically, he handles the foundation grant money to schools. And the challenge that he’s feeling is that each grant is just really reaching a small group. It’s not scaling and it’s not having the big impact that he would like. So it’s 1966 and more people have televisions than bathtubs or telephones. Kids are watching 55 hours a week, and Lloyd tells the story of his daughter getting up and watching the test pattern. There’s nothing on television. The television is on, and there’s the test pattern. Remember those days, Dave, of the test pattern?

Dave Young:

Oh, dude, you’re taking me back. I would watch the test pattern just wishing that there was something on. It was better than the snow that happens before the test pattern even comes on.

Stephen Semple:

That’s it. That’s it.

Dave Young:

Kids don’t know what we’re talking about.

Stephen Semple:

They have no idea. You’ll have to Google it. So kids from low income are not getting preschool, but they’re getting addicted to television. So here’s where it gets interesting. At a dinner party, Lloyd asked Joan this question, “What if the second problem, TV addiction, could be used to solve the first problem, the education problem? What if TV could be part of the solution? Can TV be used to educate children?” And they talk about this and they decide, “Yeah, it can.”

So they set up the Children’s Television Workshop and dedicate themselves to creating a new show. They want to create one-hour-long show that’s going to air on Public Television nationwide that’s geared towards all kids, but really geared towards all kids ages three to five. And because it’s aimed at kids of that age, it’s kind of got… The kids have a short attention span, right? So instead of modeling it after the television shows of the day, they decided to model it after popular magazines. So instead of it being one long arc like television, which tells a single story, it would be many short segments like a magazine.

Dave Young:

Honestly, I could trace a line that leads from this to Saturday Night Live.

Stephen Semple:

Well, that’s interesting.

Dave Young:

Because skit television, you said they didn’t model it after anything on TV, but I think plenty of things on TV saw the success of Sesame Street and modeled shows after it.

Stephen Semple:

That’s a very interesting observation.

Dave Young:

Recurring characters, probably as early as shows like Laugh-In, right?

Stephen Semple:

Yeah.

Dave Young:

That’d be a fun one to go down.

Stephen Semple:

That’s super interesting. But they went out there. Again, that’s one of these things of modeling something after something else. They didn’t look at television programs. They looked at popular magazines and they looked at, “Wow, there’s these many short segments, and that’s what we should be doing.” And it had not been done before on television. And they wanted to make it fun to watch with education. So the fact that they wanted to make it fun to watch with education meant Joan went out and hired academics to create the curriculum and TV folks to deliver the content in an entertaining manner.

And of course, the two groups did not get along. The academics were wondering, “Well, why are we worrying about all these jokes and all this entertainment? We’re just trying to get the kids to be able to count. Why are we spending so much time in the jokes?” Meanwhile, the creatives are going, “The jokes are the purpose to keep kids engaged. And what we really need to do is reduce the amount of curriculum so that we have room for the jokes.” And so there’s this constant tension between the two. So enter Jim Henson. Now, Jim Henson, as a kid, grew up obsessed with TV, and he wanted to get on television, but he couldn’t sing, he couldn’t dance. He had these acne scars. So he taught himself puppeteering because he wanted to get on TV. But he invented characters that were a mash-up of a puppet and a marionette. Hence, the name Muppet. Right?

Dave Young:

Yeah.

Stephen Semple:

So in 1955, while he’s still in college, he actually was making content for local television. He had national appearances on the Today Show and Ed Sullivan that predate Sesame Street, he also created Muppets for guess what? Guess what industry he did Muppets for before Sesame Street.

Dave Young:

Oh, gosh. I don’t know.

Stephen Semple:

Advertising.

Dave Young:

Oh, well, that makes sense. Sure.

Stephen Semple:

He had a dog named Rolf selling dog food. A monster of cookies eating snacks sold by General Foods.

Dave Young:

Stay tuned. We’re going to wrap up this story and tell you how to apply this lesson to your business right after this.

[Empire Builders Ad]

Dave Young:

Let’s pick up our story where we left off. And trust me, you haven’t missed a thing.

Stephen Semple:

And before Jim, when there was puppets, you would see the human performer. With Jim, the operator was not seen, which made the puppet or Muppet become a real character. That’s what made them seem real, it’s because the human operator disappeared.

Dave Young:

Wasn’t there.

Stephen Semple:

So Joan brings on Jim because she feels he has the energy and the insight that can unite the creative and the educators. Because think about it, he dealt with it in advertising, uniting the bean counters on one side and the creatives on the other side in advertising. He knew how to skate that line. So it’s 1969, they’re getting ready to produce the first show, and it’s, “Where do you set it?” So they decided to set it on an urban street based on Harlem. That was the reality in New York. But how do you now make it relatable to rural kids as well? People greeting each other. Everyone knowing each other’s name. Again, skated this line to make it relatable to all kids and had characters that were a Black couple, a young white guy, an older white guy. So they tried to create as much of a mix as possible. And originally, on the original pilot, the Muppet segments were separated from the real people. So you saw real people-

Dave Young:

They weren’t interacting.

Stephen Semple:

You saw Muppets. They weren’t interacting. And what they found is, kids only cared when the Muppets were on. So they decided to change the format where there’s always a Muppet. And they created specific ones that interacted with humans. For example, Oscar the Grouch and Big Bird. The other thing that they discovered is, Big Bird originally was this big bumbling character, and they changed him slightly, where they basically made Big Bird a six-year-old. If you really look at Big Bird as a character, big Bird is a six-year-old. So while things are being explained to Big Bird, they’re being explained to the six-year-olds without speaking down to the six-year-olds by using Big Bird as a six-year-old. So the new segments work great, and after three years, they’re ready to go. Literally at the last minute, they still haven’t decided the name. The morning of the afternoon press conference, according to things I’ve read, they still had no name for it. And they’re bouncing around names.

Dave Young:

Really?

Stephen Semple:

And they finally realized that they wanted the name to sound like a magic word. And somebody said like, “Magic word like open sesame.” And they went, “Sesame Street.”

Dave Young:

I love it. I love it.

Stephen Semple:

Now, there’s no commercial sponsors because it’s a not-for-profit. There’s a cameo from Carol Burnett, and it first airs on the Boston Public Broadcasting Network, WGB, and they get 7,600 calls and 2,000 letters all praising the show. And kids are singing ABCs and learning to count. And according to studies, underserved kids are improving cognitive skills by over 60% learning from TV.

Dave Young:

I believe it. I believe it.

Stephen Semple:

A whole new concept, even gets praise from President Richard Nixon, who later tries to cut funding. But that’s a different whole other story. And they’re literally producing 130 episodes a year, but they’re also reaching seven million kids five days a week. And, by the way, Sesame Street is still on television, streams on Netflix, and it continues there on PBS.

Dave Young:

I’ve got to check it out on Netflix. I could be watching it still? Gosh darn it.

Stephen Semple:

You could be watching it still.

Dave Young:

Well, you’ve made my day. If this podcast ends right now, I’m a happy man.

Stephen Semple:

See, I wanted to give you some good news. I wanted to give you some good news.

Dave Young:

I’d go see my old friends.

Stephen Semple:

Now, my favorite part of all of this is this whole idea of the conversation starting looking at two problems. In the conversation, from what I’ve read in terms of interviews and things along that line, it literally was, “We’ve got these two problems. Kids are getting addicted to television. Problem. Underprivileged kids are falling behind. Problem.” And then Lloyd asking that question, “Can we use one to solve the other?” That framing of the problem totally changes the mindset of how you think about it. And I could just hear that conversation in my head of somebody, of a Dave Young going, well, “Could we do this?” And all of a sudden the whole energy around the conversation changing and people going, “Yeah, maybe we can use one to solve the other.”

Dave Young:

I think we probably could do that.

Stephen Semple:

It’s the reframing of the problem as an asset to be used, I thought was just like, “Wow, that was a magical, magical moment,” and was my favorite part of the whole thing. And then when I got actually looking at some of these studies, 95% of preschoolers, I’m like, “Jeez, nothing hits that number.”

Dave Young:

Well now, remember, this was back when there were only three TV networks plus public television.

Stephen Semple:

True.

Dave Young:

And so, it was a little easier to reach 95% because they didn’t have many other choices.

Stephen Semple:

Absolutely.

Dave Young:

If you were the only channel that had something for kids on, kids are going to watch that. But the town I lived in, we were the first town, I think, I remember hearing, we were one of the first towns in America to have cable TV because we sat in a little valley and we couldn’t get any over the air signals except for PBS.

Stephen Semple:

Oh, I see. So it was-

Dave Young:

Then they finally figured out a way to microwave signals from Denver in, and then we could get the other channels. So there was probably a time when that was about the only thing you could watch.

Stephen Semple:

So it’s really interesting. As I said, the whole, the impact, and I knew pretty much anybody, all you have to say is, “Can you tell me how to get…”

Dave Young:

“How to get to Sesame Street?”

Stephen Semple:

And everyone can finish that. When we think about building an empire, because empires don’t necessarily have to be businesses or for-profit organizations. Empires are something that’s had this massive impact. And then you even took it that step further and said, “Look, other shows took that idea and went, ‘Wow, wait a minute. We can do sketches and things like that on television.'”

Dave Young:

Prove to me that Saturday Night Live is not just Sesame Street for adults.

Stephen Semple:

Yeah, you know what-

Dave Young:

It’s not trying to teach us anything.

Stephen Semple:

But the model, I had not put those two things together. And I think that’s a brilliant, brilliant observation.

Dave Young:

As you mentioned that they model it after magazines, and my guess is that the magazine that they modeled after was Weekly Reader.

Stephen Semple:

I don’t know that one.

Dave Young:

You don’t know Weekly Reader?

Stephen Semple:

I was never a big magazine reader.

Dave Young:

So this Weekly Reader was a little classroom magazine that they distributed in the school and it had short stories and little games. It was almost like the menu at an IHOP or something. It had all these little lessons and it started…

Stephen Semple:

Cool.

Dave Young:

It would be another good one. It was acquired by Scholastic, still running, but it was started in 1902.

Stephen Semple:

Interesting. Interesting.

Dave Young:

Maybe it wasn’t a Canadian thing, but there was probably not an American kid that didn’t ever read a Weekly Reader.

Stephen Semple:

And the fact it was in schools, that’s probably the magazine that they use. Super interesting.

Dave Young:

It had a wide variety of things, like you’d read an article about an explorer, or you’d read an article about… There were little human interest, there were little educational bits, and then there were always some-

Stephen Semple:

Cool.

Dave Young:

Fill in the blanks or puzzles or games or things like that.

Stephen Semple:

Cool.

Dave Young:

As soon as you said that Sesame Street came from magazines, I’m like, “Oh, well, Weekly Reader. That’s exactly it.”

Stephen Semple:

So there’s lots of learning and modeling. They learned from the magazine, they reframed a problem as an asset. And then, when there’s this issue between the creatives, the academics, they use Jim Henson’s experience from dealing with advertising and bringing those two groups together. So I thought there was just lots of really cool modeling and learning that went on in Sesame Street.

Dave Young:

And we’re adults. We got to talk about Sesame Street for 15, 20 minutes.

Stephen Semple:

Made your morning, didn’t it?

Dave Young:

I love it. I love it. Thank you for bringing us the story of Sesame Street. Brought to you by the letter W or Wizard.

Stephen Semple:

There we are. All right, thanks David.

Dave Young:

Thank you. Thanks for listening to the podcast. Please share us. Subscribe on your favorite podcast app and leave us a big fat juicy five-star rating and review at Apple Podcasts. And if you’d like to schedule your own 90-minute empire building session, you can do it @empirebuildingprogram.com.