Avril Lavigne is everywhere, and to quote the young starlet herself, she’s getting ‘famouser’ each day. But she’s not like the other pop stars.

You won’t, for example, find T-shirts with her face on them, and a line of bubble-gum trading cards is not planned. Avril is an antidote to Britney and Shakira, and in contrast to those stars, something of an anti-brand. Yet marketers are drooling over this hot new property.

‘We have a business affairs department that handles third-party requests all day long,’ says Jill Snell, manager of artist marketing at Toronto-based BMG Canada. ‘From a corporate point of view, there’s been a ton of interest in bringing her on board.’

So far BMG, and Vancouver-based Nettwerk Management, which represents the young artist, have said no to everybody, from car companies to food and beverage makers, mobile phone services to clothing lines.

‘Some skateboard companies have wanted to align themselves with her,’ Snell continues. ‘Recently Parmalat called us, and certainly that’s a company we’re really interested in working with, but it’s almost been out of our hands. [The management team has said] no, no, no. They’ve been really smart about making it about the music, and that’s a very responsible position to be in.’

But Snell, who filters some of the requests that go to management, adds that ‘We never say never because her management is really aggressive and Nettwerk is smart, so you never know when they’ll say, ‘this is right’ or ‘this doesn’t threaten anything.”

‘I think eventually they’ll hook up with some major sponsor that’s a good match for her, where it becomes an endorsement program.’

Avril’s manager, Nettwerk’s Shauna Gold, sees things differently.

‘I get multiple calls every day with people trying to get Avril to endorse something, and she’s very much against it. You’ll never see Avril wearing something that she’s been paid to endorse.

‘A lot of what draws Avril’s fans to her is that she’s so real. She’s not a fantasy. She doesn’t go out and buy extravagant clothes. The average person could go to a store and buy the clothes she wears. People think ‘that could be me.’ If she were to turn around and ‘sell out,’ so to speak, I think they would look at that as being a bit of what she’s not about. That’s a good hunch.’

Snell agrees that a misguided advertising deal could put Avril’s credibility on the line.

‘It would be horrible. If it was a product her fans don’t believe in, that they find bogus, that they don’t get, or that they think is not cool, then she’s putting her credibility in danger, and she’s also putting her own beliefs and morals aside as well. I’m thinking of something super commercial [with a wide demographic]. I don’t think that would be a wise move for her.’

But Snell tempers that opinion with the comment that ‘fans decide whether they believe it or not. They look at her and say, ‘I get it.’ And anything she puts her weight behind has to deliver the same kind of message that she does herself. Hopefully when they do align themselves, then it’s sending a positive message. Or at least it’s a product that kids can really relate to.’

The Avril brand

Everyone agrees that Avril is a brand, but the brand that is Avril is a contradiction in terms. She’s a rebel, yet she’s as establishment as they get. She’s a punk, but parents love her. She’s a superstar, but she’s just an ordinary kid. While some call this hypocrisy, millions of fans are unfazed.

Kelly Lynne Ashton, a senior producer at Toronto-based Big Orbit, recently completed a survey through Reactorz, the company’s online research forum, to find out what eight- to 17-year-olds really think about Avril. Her conclusion is that ‘most of them think that she represents their generation in a way that no other pop star that’s out there right now does. Particularly because she’s Canadian, but also because she’s just a regular teen. Her lyrics are issues they can relate to.’

Ashton registered a number of teens who thought of Avril as a ‘poser,’ (almost 25%) but the overwhelming majority identified with her, and ardent fans weren’t influenced at all by detractors within the online chat.

Regular teens, of course, do not drop out of high school and move to New York to record an album. And they don’t go on worldwide tours to sing (Avril will hit Europe, Asia and Australia in the next three months). Or sell four million albums in a single year. Yet compared to more ‘manufactured’ idols, Avril’s mythical rise to stardom doesn’t make her that different from ordinary kids.

‘I definitely think [her fans] understand to some degree that she is a product of the industry,’ says Kaaren Whitney-Vernon, publisher of Toronto-based Youth Culture’s teen mags Fuel and Verve. ‘But Pop Stars, American Idol… these bands are created and there’s awareness of that. Avril’s not a country singer now; she’s a skater. Kids know that and think it’s cool.’

Marketers think it’s pretty cool too. ‘At marketing meetings, a lot of times they use Avril Lavigne as a poster child,’ Whitney-Vernon says. ‘She’s a very appealing person. Everyone loves her.’ That’s literally everyone. Her first single, ‘Complicated’ set a new record for number of spins in one week (according to Billboard’s singles chart) in the Mainstream Top 40 category. Meanwhile, the video – which revealed Lavigne as a young punk instead of a crooning 30-year-old woman like radio fans may have thought – eclipsed the previous spin record on MTV.

The next single, ‘Sk8er Boi,’ won a younger audience, says Snell. ‘Eight- and nine-year-olds instantly knew every word to that song.’ And older teens weren’t alienated by it. ‘Right now, I think we’re tapping into 18 to 34 more than we were in the middle [of Avril’s success]. But it’s hard to maintain a huge audience. Sooner or later it will settle on a very specific demo.’

The sell-out conundrum

While Avril and her manager fret about alienating fans with endorsement deals, others are less convinced this is a danger.

For one thing, it will be difficult to tell when or if Avril ‘sells out.’ What would she be selling out? Her principal characteristic – youthful rebellion – was collectively determined a saleable commodity some time ago, and Avril admits to no distinguishing beliefs or morals that she might subsequently contradict.

According to Whitney-Vernon, ‘She doesn’t really have a statement. Avril’s not coming out and saying she’s for a better environment. She’s not Rage Against the Machine. She’s not like U2, talking about helping the world. She’s really into her music and she doesn’t go beyond that in public. You read about her being a vegetarian, but then she says, ‘oh, but I like to eat other things,’ so she’s not really a vegetarian.’

Meanwhile, Whitney-Vernon says that another recent online research project involving youth aged 12 to 23, conducted through the Youth Culture Group’s research division, discovered that ‘kids we talked to have no problem with celebrity endorsement.’

In fact, one 17-year-old said that ‘the ads for Pepsi with Shakira and Britney are awesome and it gives some change from seeing the usual Pepsi ads.’ Another 17-year-old girl said: ‘companies know that youths spend a lot of money on products and having favourite celebrities represent will only increase their sales.’

The Reactorz survey confirms these findings, with Ashton commenting that ‘kids actually like celebrity endorsements if they like the celebrity, and of the people they like, they just want to see more of them.’

How could something work?

As much as Avril might dislike the thought of product endorsement, it’s almost impossible to avoid with her level of media exposure. The Avril necktie is still a fad among young teenage girls, and the Home Hardware in Napanee, Ont. is still churning out T-shirts to keep up with worldwide demand that broke out when Avril appeared on Saturday Night Live wearing one of her own.

Product seeding – that is, sending free samples (or cheques) in the hope that Avril might be seen with your brand – seems like a natural fit, but Gold swears it won’t happen.

‘People send clothing all the time. If she likes something, she’ll wear it just because she likes it. But you’ll never see her wear something because she’s paid to endorse it.’ Of course, that means that anything that does make the cut has double the value.

Like most artists who tour, Avril already has her own line of merchandise (see www.avrilmerch.com). The difference is that Avril doesn’t sell T-shirts with her face on them. Her shirts look more like skateboard wear – usually black, with understated red or white logos.

Nettwerk also sells neckties, pins, stickers and wallets with the logo, all Avril-approved. Avril’s fans don’t want a piece of her, like the girls who buy the Spice Girls notebook and pen. They want to be her. And any brand extension of her would probably look more like the Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen empire (twin-approved style) than Britney’s Pepsi mugs.

There are a number of brands that might be a good fit with Avril’s brand of ‘rebellion lite’ (as Craig Marks, editor of Blender magazine so astutely put it in an interview with The Globe and Mail).

‘Pepsi, I think kids would have a problem with that,’ Ashton says. ‘But if it were Mountain Dew or something that fit into their perception of her, then I don’t think they would have a problem with it.’

Snell suggests that items she ‘would even bother to look at’ would include things like ‘youthful computer games or sporting things on the edgier side, like skateboarding, because she’s actually really interested in that.’

Mark Milne, co-president of Hamilton, Ont.-based indie label Sonic Unyon, thinks that iPod might be a good fit. Or anyone selling studded belts.

And in general, it seems that for fashion companies, that may be the answer for now. Wait and see what Avril likes, then sell, sell, sell.