New HarrisX and Allison Worldwide Study Reveals Gen Alpha Teens Emerge as the CMOs of the American Household – While Moms Remain the Chief Household Officers

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New research shows how Gen Alpha teens and their parents — girls, boys, moms and dads — each uniquely influence brand performance across American households

Amazon and Nike top the Gen Alpha Household brand ranking, earning high cultural relevance and converting it into commercial strength with both teens and their parents

The study is unveiled as part of the Gen Alpha Household Intelligence Platform, a quarterly brand tracking system delivered through HarrisX's AskTheo AI

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- HarrisX and Allison Worldwide today announced the release of the Gen Alpha Household Influence Study. American households are undergoing a generational shift in how brand preferences and purchase decisions are made—and how influence moves between people under the same roof.

(Image courtesy of: HarrisX and Allison Worldwide)

That dynamic begins with a striking finding: household brand influence does not flow in one direction. Ninety-one percent of parents say their Gen Alpha teen influences which brands they like. At the same time, 73% of Gen Alpha teens say their mom shapes what brands they like — more than any influencer, celebrity or social media platform.

There are approximately 67 million Gen Alpha children in the United States, including roughly 16 million teenagers ages 13 to 16. Most of these teens are being raised by Millennials — the first generation of parents to grow up online themselves — creating a household dynamic unlike anything brands have encountered before.

“Winning with Gen Alpha will require more than marketing to teenagers; it requires understanding how brand and product value, loyalty and purchasing behavior are perceived and reconciled across the entire household," said Dritan Nesho, CEO & Founder of HarrisX. "When it comes to the Gen Alpha household, the CMO is 15 years old and the CEOs are in their early 40s. Teens lead discovery and top of funnel exploration and parents have the power of the purse and conversion — making for a unique and up until now under-explored, dynamic."

That insight is the foundation behind the Gen Alpha Household Intelligence Platform, a new proprietary brand performance system offered by Allison Worldwide and HarrisX that measures and tracks how brands perform across Gen Alpha households among teens, parents, girls, boys, moms and dads.

The platform produces a Gen Alpha Household Brand Score for brands across all six audience segments, powered by the Gen Alpha Household Influence Study. The inaugural study, developed by HarrisX and Allison Worldwide, surveyed 1,500 respondents — Gen Alpha teens ages 13–16 and parents of Gen Alpha teens — in a nationally representative sample. New waves will be conducted quarterly.

The Gen Alpha Brand Score measures which brands are winning the household purchase decision today, while, in parallel, tracking which brands are building the next generation of loyalty.

"The most surprising finding in this study isn't about a brand. It's about a relationship," said Anne Colaiacovo, CEO, North America of Allison Worldwide. "When it comes to shaping what brands Gen Alpha teens like, mom is more influential than any social media platform, creator or celebrity. Brands that miss the household will miss an early opportunity to build loyalty and commercial success with Gen Alpha and their gatekeeper mom.”

Key Findings from the Gen Alpha Household Influence Study:

• 80% of Gen Alpha teens say their parents shape the brands they like, including 73% who cite their mom and 58% who cite their dad.
• 91% of parents say their Gen Alpha teens influence the brands they themselves choose, making teens the most influential force on parent brand preference in the study.
• 60% of dads say their Gen Alpha teens recently introduced them to a new brand they wouldn't otherwise have known.
• No single platform shapes brand preferences across the entire Gen Alpha household. TikTok is the most important online platform for teen girls (42%), followed by Pinterest (19%). YouTube leads with teen boys (35%) and dads (32%), while Facebook ranks first among moms (24%).
• Amazon emerges as the strongest brand among the 25 brands evaluated, ranking first among teens and fourth among parents.
• Nike ranks second overall, outperforming all other brands on cultural relevance across the Gen Alpha household and ranking first with both Gen Alpha teen boys and their dads.
• McDonald's ranks third overall, placing in the top five with both teens and parents, but faces a significant challenge from Chick-fil-A among teens, who rank Chick-fil-A second, ahead of McDonald's.
• Walmart ranks fourth overall and first among parents, driven by dominant performance among moms.

"Knowing which brands Gen Alpha teens like is only half the picture. They don't yet control their own spending, but they are already shaping what brands enter the household and what their parents buy and prefer,” said Dom Bartkus, Executive Vice President at HarrisX. “That's what makes this study unique and a powerful tool for brands looking to win with Gen Alpha teens and their households alike."

Meet the New American Household CMO. She is 15.

When parents buy brands for their Gen Alpha teens, 62% of those purchases are driven by the teen proactively asking for the brand. Gen Alpha teen girls exert especially strong influence over household purchasing: in families with girls, teens drive 67% of purchases that parents make for them, compared to 59% in households with boys.

Sephora and e.l.f. Cosmetics show the strongest teen-driven purchasing in the study, with 73% of parent purchases initiated by the teen. Both brands also outperform significantly with teen girls, powered by strong performance on cultural relevance with this audience. When asked to choose from several beauty brands included in the study, 60% of Gen Alpha teen girls said they would ask their parents to buy e.l.f. products.

"Gen Alpha teen girls are not just influential. They are commercially decisive,” said Colaiacovo. “In households with teen girls, teens are initiating two in three purchases their parents make for them. That's not influence. That's purchasing authority. And the brands that have built genuine emotional connection with teen girls are seeing it convert directly into transactions."

Starbucks and Bath & Body Works also outperform with this key audience—ranking in the top 10 among Gen Alpha teen girls.

Moms and Dads Are Not the Same Audience

For moms, Walmart isn’t simply a preferred retailer – it’s an anchor brand. It ranks first among moms by a wide margin, a key advantage given the critical role moms play in household purchasing decisions and shaping which brands their Gen Alpha teens like. Wendy's also outperforms with moms, ranking fifth — its strongest audience performance in the study.

Dads tell a different story. Nike ranks first among dads, followed by McDonald’s and Walmart. Adidas and Samsung are two brands that significantly outperform with dads, ranking fourth and eighth respectively — stronger than their performance with any other household segment.

Dads also emerge as the parent segment most open to teen-driven discovery: 60% say their Gen Alpha teen recently introduced them to a new brand they otherwise would not have known about, compared to 39% among moms. Dads are also more likely to approve of their teens buying brands tested in the study at 78% approval, compared to 76% among moms.

The findings suggest dads retain a particularly strong emotional affinity for legacy brands that have maintained cultural relevance across generations, while moms are more likely to play the gatekeeper role in household purchasing decisions.

The First Brand Performance System Built for the Gen Alpha Household

The Gen Alpha Household Intelligence Platform is the first brand performance system purpose-built to measure how brands win and lose across the full Gen Alpha household. Drawing on the Gen Alpha Household Influence Study, it scores each brand across six audience segments on four strategic pillars: Brand Presence, Cultural Relevance, Household Momentum and Commercial Strength.

Insights are delivered through HarrisX's AskTheo AI platform, giving brands real-time access to findings, competitive rankings and audience-level intelligence.

Unlike traditional brand-tracking systems built around a single consumer and a linear brand funnel, the Gen Alpha Household Intelligence Platform measures the two-way influence dynamics that define how Gen Alpha households make brand decisions — capturing teen cultural relevance, parental approval, generational identity, household advocacy and commercial conversion simultaneously.

New waves of the Gen Alpha Household Influence Study will be fielded quarterly, giving brands ongoing access to syndicated tracking, category-specific competitive deep dives, household strategy development and advisory services.

For complete brand rankings, category-specific findings and custom competitive analysis, visit GenAlphaBrands.com.

Study Methodology
The HarrisX-Allison Worldwide Gen Alpha Household Influence Study was conducted in the United States from May 4 to May 12, 2026, among a total sample of 1,500 respondents, including 750 Gen Alpha teens ages 13–16 and 750 parents of Gen Alpha teens. Respondents were recruited through a broad variety of professional, validated respondent panels to expand the sampling frame and minimize the influence of any single panel’s recruiting methods.

Results were weighted for age, gender, region, race/ethnicity, income, political party, education, and ideology where necessary to align them with their actual proportions in the population. The margin of error for the total sample is +/- 2.5 percentage points.

About HarrisX
HarrisX, a Stagwell company, is a strategic research and advisory firm that delivers clear, data-driven answers to complex and pressing questions faced by corporate, political and government clients. Powered by proprietary technology and a campaign-style approach, we move fast, cut through the noise, and surface insights that drive real-world impact. With offices in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Singapore and Australia, we advise Fortune 100 companies, public institutions, global leaders, NGOs, and philanthropic organizations. Named one of top and most accurate pollsters of the 2020 and 2024 U.S. presidential elections, HarrisX doesn't just deliver data — we deliver confident decisions. Learn more at www.harrisx.com.

About Allison Worldwide
Allison Worldwide is an earned-first, data-led, and future-focused communications agency helping clients see around corners and be ahead of what's next. Not too big and not too small, Allison provides end-to-end global communications, PR, influencer, analytics and marketing support to clients from the Fortune 500 to start-ups. Allison is owned by Stagwell (NASDAQ: STGW), one of the fastest growing and most influential marketing and communications networks in the world. Learn more at www.allisonworldwide.com.

About Stagwell
Stagwell is the challenger holding company built to transform marketing. We deliver scaled creative performance for the world’s most ambitious brands, connecting culture-moving creativity with leading-edge technology to harmonize the art and science of marketing. Led by entrepreneurs, our specialists in 35+ countries are unified under a single purpose: to drive effectiveness and improve business results for our clients. Join us at www.stagwellglobal.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260825638517/en/

Media Contact:
Linda Burns
Linda.Burns@allisonworldwide.com

Source: Allison Worldwide