What it's like being a Beano Brain Trendspotter

At Beano Brain our Trendspotters are fundamental to everything we do.  Longitudinal, ethnographic panels of kids aged 7 – 16 across UK, US and even China, these kids and families give us a super-privileged view into their lives.  We see kids and teens through many milestones throughout their time (years) with us. 

Last week - Freddie who is about to leave our teen panel - joined us for some work experience, and we asked him to write an honest article about what life was like as a Trendspotter for Beano Brain, this is what he had to say...  

I have been working with beano for the last 7 years as a part of their Trendspotter team, I’ve watched how the Trendspotter format has evolved, and I help answer questionnaires and give the Beano Brain team a little insight into the world of a 16 year old .   

As part of my role as a Beano Brain Trendspotter, I answer weekly questions on what’s popular and trending within the world of kids; I give insight into the rising stars and celebrities that my age group love and share the brands that I enjoy and have noticed gaining popularity. But being part of the Trendspotter team is more than just answering questions weekly, it’s having the ability to share what interests me personally and the chance to have influence on brands, people and much more get recognised as popular. 

The weekly questions range in topics and give me the chance to reflect on what I have noticed trending at the time and give the opportunity to reflect on what I enjoy. I sometimes find myself realising stuff that I personally love and enjoy whilst writing my answer to these questions.  

Since I first became a Trendspotter back in 2018, I’ve seen how much love and attention they put into the Beano Brain and how they really do take on board the opinions and thoughts given to them by the Trendspotters. The team that works behind Beano Brain really inspire the teen Trendspotters to take a deeper look into different social media platforms and current trends and this drive and want for a deeper understanding of current trends from the team has helped me to give my most detailed answers possible every week.  

As a long-time member of the Trendspotters team, I have noticed the growing passion for Beano Brain and how they are constantly changing their way of collecting data from Trendspotters to make sure there gaining the most detailed information in the most efficient way. I have a lot more time to reflect and work on my response to make sure that there the best they can be. 

Beano Brain is more than just a group of researchers trying to get information out of Gen Z and Gen Alpha, they’re a team of hard-working people with a real passion for the industry and they have a real care for the teens that work on their Trendspotter panel. 

The Beano Brain team don’t only care about what you’re enjoying at the moment or the current popular trend amongst your friends, they care about how there Trendspotters are, and provide an opportunity for us to talk about how we feel and what’s going on within in are life at the moment. They provide a safe space for the teens within their panel to express themselves and feel seen and like their opinions matter.  

My 7 years working with Beano Brain and my week’s work experience at Beano Towers in London  has helped me realise a few things; Its helped me to see where my answers to their questions can lead to, and how my answers really do matter and help shape the content that beano release. It has given me a deeper understanding of what I enjoy and am interested in and let me have the opportunity to reflect on my passions once a week and it's also made me appreciate how lucky I am to be working with a company like Beano Brain that has so much passion for their work and care so deeply about the brand and the people that work for that brand .  

My answer to the question of what’s it like to be a beano brain Trendspotter is that it’s fantastic and it’s a very enjoyable role that is really fulfilling and makes me realise just how wonderful and kind the Beano company are.