Why Do Kids Care About Characters So Much?
The Kids Engagement Series #05 | What Disney can teach us about turning an experience into a relationship
Think about some of the brands children recognise instantly.
Take away the logo. Take away the company name. Take away the advertising.
What’s left? Very often, it’s a character.
For Disney, characters aren't simply illustrations attached to a product. They're the people - or toys, monsters, animals and snowmen - children form the relationship with.
A child doesn't need to understand the organisation behind Toy Story to care about Woody. They don't need to know anything about Disney's marketing strategy to want to meet Elsa. They simply know the character, understand something about their personality and, crucially, care what happens to them next.
And that gives organisations trying to engage children something really interesting to think about.
Because children don't build relationships with logos in quite the same way.
They build relationships with characters.
Disney doesn't leave its characters on the screen
This is where Disney becomes particularly interesting.
A character might begin in a film, but the relationship doesn't necessarily end when the credits roll. Disney takes those characters into books, toys, games, hotel experiences, live shows, attractions and physical environments.
Look at Toy Story. Disney describes how children and families can now encounter that story through attractions, character meetings, hotels, dining and shopping across its parks around the world. At Shanghai Disney Resort, guests are effectively shrunk to toy size and dropped into Andy's backyard. Disney Parks Blog
Or look at the new World of Frozen at Disneyland Paris, which opened in March 2026. Children don't simply watch Arendelle on a screen. They can walk through it, enter the castle, encounter Anna and Elsa and experience familiar elements of the story around them. Disney Parks Blog
The character becomes a thread.
SCREEN → EXPERIENCE → PLAY → PRODUCT → MEMORY
And Disney itself talks about the deep emotional connection audiences have with its stories and characters. The Walt Disney Company
That's the clever bit. The character gives all those different interactions a familiar face.
But you don't need Mickey Mouse.
It's easy to look at Disney and think: Well, of course that works. It's Disney.
But the principle is useful on a much smaller scale.
A hotel doesn't need a globally recognised character. A council doesn't need a multimillion-pound film franchise. A charity doesn't need children arriving already knowing its mascot.
What they need is a reason for the child to care about the character they're meeting.
And this is where we think there's a big difference between a mascot and a character.
A mascot can simply exist. A character has a personality!
They want something. They like things. They dislike things. They make mistakes. They need help. They set challenges. They celebrate success. They might be brave, chaotic, curious, shy, mischievous or completely ridiculous.
Most importantly, they have a job within the child's experience.
We see this in the products we create.
At The Wonder Company, characters can play a really practical role in helping children navigate an experience or understand a message.
If we're creating an activity book around healthy living, for example, a character doesn't have to stand in the corner of the page telling a child to “eat five portions of fruit and vegetables”.
They can go on the journey with them.
They can attempt the challenge. Get something wrong. Discover a new food. Ask the child for help. Set a mission. Celebrate when it's completed.
Suddenly, the child isn't being told something.
They're participating in a story.
That's particularly powerful when we're creating resources around subjects that organisations genuinely need children to understand - food and nutrition, movement, wellbeing, STEM (now STEAM), the environment or even more difficult subjects.
The information still matters. We just change who delivers it.
And characters can connect an entire experience.
This is something we're particularly interested in when developing products for hospitality and visitor experiences.
Imagine arriving at a hotel and meeting a character inside your welcome pack.
That same character appears in an activity book and sends you on missions around the resort. You spot them on signs. They tell you where to find your next stamp. Perhaps they change outfits depending on the activity they're trying.
By the end of the stay, the child hasn't simply completed an activity booklet.
They've been on an adventure with someone.
And when that book goes home - something we talked about in our last Kids
Engagement article - the character goes home too.
That's where several of the principles we've explored in this series start joining together.
The child participates.
They make progress.
The experience has an afterlife.
And the character gives them something to connect with emotionally.
Characters can make learning feel different too.
We see the same opportunity in the activity books and resources we create for councils and holiday programmes.
A child might be learning about nutrition.
But instead of opening a resource that announces “Today we're learning about healthy eating”, perhaps they're helping a character build the ultimate plate, complete a food mission or solve a challenge.
The learning hasn't disappeared.
In fact, it may be more effective precisely because learning isn't how the child experiences it.
They're solving. Playing. Helping. Discovering.
And hopefully learning something along the way without somebody needing to announce that learning is taking place.
That's an important distinction for us at The Wonder Company. We don't use characters simply to make a page look child-friendly. We use them when they can help make the content itself more engaging.
So what makes a character actually work?
Putting googly eyes on a vegetable isn't necessarily a character strategy. There needs to be something underneath it. When we're developing one, we'd think about four stages:
MEET → CONNECT → FOLLOW → REMEMBER
MEET — Give the child a reason to notice them.
CONNECT — Give them a personality the child can understand.
FOLLOW — Give the character a role in moving the experience forward.
REMEMBER — Make them distinctive enough that the child recognises them next time.
The really interesting part is FOLLOW.
Because that's where a nice illustration becomes an engagement tool.
The character can lead a treasure hunt. Introduce a puzzle. Explain something complicated. Set a challenge. Reveal the next stage. Encourage a child who is struggling.
Give them something to collect. Appear somewhere unexpected. They're not decoration.They're part of the experience.
THE WONDER TEST: DISNEY CHARACTERS
PICK IT UP ✓
Recognisable characters create immediate interest and give children a familiar entry point into an experience.
GET INVOLVED ✓
Disney allows children to move beyond watching characters to meeting them and stepping inside their worlds. Its parks increasingly describe these experiences in exactly those terms. Disney Parks Blog
STICK WITH IT ✓
Story gives children a reason to discover what happens next, while characters can reappear across multiple experiences.
KEEP IT ✓
Characters travel easily into books, toys, games and objects that continue the relationship at home. Disney has been extending its stories into products since Mickey Mouse licensing began in 1930. The Walt Disney Company
SHARE IT ✓
Characters create common reference points children can play with, talk about and experience with family and friends.
REMEMBER IT ✓
This is perhaps Disney's greatest strength. The characters themselves become memory triggers for the experience and the wider brand.
Wonder Score: 6/6 ⭐
The Wonder Verdict: Disney shows us that a great character isn't something you add to children's engagement at the end. It can be the thread that holds the whole experience together.
One thing to take away…
✗ You don't need Mickey Mouse.
✗ You don't need a film.
✗ And you definitely don't need Disney's budget.
But if you're trying to communicate with children, ask yourself: Who is doing the talking?
❓Could a character make your message easier to understand?
❓Could they lead children through an experience rather than simply decorate it?
❓Could they turn five separate activities into one connected adventure?
❓Could children meet them at the beginning, follow them through the experience and remember them afterwards?
Because perhaps the opportunity isn't simply to create a mascot children recognise.
It's to create a character they want to follow.
MEET → CONNECT → FOLLOW → REMEMBER
And if that character can help a child play, discover, learn or understand something along the way?
That's when character becomes much more than decoration.
It becomes part of the engagement.
About The Wonder Company
Every organisation has a story to tell. We help children discover it.
The Wonder Company creates activity books, magazines, games, packs and bespoke resources that help organisations turn their stories, messages and objectives into experiences children actually want to engage with.
That might mean developing characters that guide children through a hotel or visitor attraction, turning healthy-living messages into missions and games, creating a comic children genuinely want to read, or building an entire activity resource around a story.
Because we're not creating things simply to look child-friendly. We're creating reasons for children to get involved.
Want to create something children will remember?
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