Back to School Marketing: Who’s Buying, Where They Are, and How to Reach Them

Who’s Actually Shopping? The Three Audiences Brands Miss

Most back-to-school marketing treats the season like it has one type of buyer. It does not. There are at least three distinct audiences spending money right now, and each of them needs a completely different approach. 

Parents: Value-Driven and Trust-Led

Parents are the primary decision-makers and the ones who hold the purse strings. According to JLL’s 2026 Back-to-School Report, parents plan to spend an average of $489 per child this season – up 11.7% year on year, well ahead of inflation. Two-thirds of parents are actively hunting for discount codes and coupons, and over 40% are buying only what is strictly needed.

What that means for brands: Parents are spending more, but they are spending more carefully. They want products they can trust and to hear about them from people they trust- other parents. That is where influencer marketing earns its keep – a family influencer who has tested a product, weighed up the cost, and given an honest verdict carries far more weight than any ad. And do not overlook grandparents! They contribute meaningfully to back-to-school spending and tend to shop based on what the parents around them recommend, making an indirect influencer reach a genuine opportunity.

Students: Identity-Driven and Platform-Native

Students (particularly those heading to college for the first time) are one of the most valuable audiences in this season and one of the most misunderstood. According to PwC’s 2026 Back-to-School Survey, 61% of parents now allow their children some direct participation in the online shopping experience, and half of high school parents say their child influences tech purchase decisions. Students are actively shaping the back-to-school shopping list.

For college students especially, back-to-school spending is about identity as much as practicality. Dorm room essentials, a new wardrobe, and the right water bottle are all signals which go way beyond ‘just’ a purchase. The “college haul” and “dorm setup” content categories are among the most-watched formats on TikTok and YouTube every summer for exactly this reason. Brands that understand this activate creators who speak to aspiration and give them the creative freedom to create content that feels like theirs.

Teachers: The Niche Nobody’s Talking About

Here is the audience most brands are completely ignoring: teachers. According to AdoptAClassroom.org’s Teacher Impact Survey, the average teacher now spends $895 of their own money on classroom supplies every year – a 49% increase since 2015. Over 90% of teachers fund their own classrooms. They are active, motivated back-to-school shoppers, and they are doing it largely on their own dime.

Teacher haul content is a well-established niche, particularly in the US, where educator creators have built loyal followings around classroom setups, supply recommendations, and the reality of funding their own rooms. 

Beyond that, teacher gifting, where parents buy for their child’s teacher at the start of the year, is particularly prominent in the US market. Brands in stationery, organisation, wellness, and lifestyle have a genuine and largely untapped opportunity to reach this audience through influencers who live it every day.

Why Influencers Are the Smartest Back-to-School Marketing Idea

Back-to-school purchasing is social by nature. People ask other parents, watch hauls, read reviews, and take cues from people whose lives look like theirs. The decision is peer-driven long before it becomes transactional – and that is exactly the environment influencer marketing was built for.

The numbers back this up. In 2026, consumer trust in influencers has reached roughly two-thirds of consumers, and creator content will continue to play an outsized role in how younger people discover and evaluate information  – above search results and above peer reviews. 

For Gen Z specifically, influencer-driven purchases have surged to 56%, up from 41% just three years ago. Critically, according to Deloitte’s 2025 Back-to-School Survey, 75% of Gen Z parents plan to use social media in their back-to-school shopping journey, and social media shoppers spend 1.8 times more than shoppers who do not use social media.

What makes influencers particularly powerful for the back-to-school marketing season is the trust dynamic at play across every audience type. A parent creator who walks through exactly what they bought and why it was worth the money is more persuasive than any ad. A college student showing their dorm setup is not posting a product review; they are building an identity that their followers want to emulate. A teacher creator recommending a classroom staple speaks directly to a community that is already listening.

That peer-to-peer credibility cannot be manufactured. The brands that work with the right creators, give them genuine creative freedom, and show up on the right platforms, are the ones that earn it.

Back-to-School Marketing Ideas: How to Actually Activate Influencers

Knowing you need influencers is one thing. Knowing how to activate them well is another. Here are the formats that consistently deliver during back-to-school sales season.

Haul and Unboxing Content

Haul content is the engine of back-to-school influencer marketing. Creators walking through everything they bought is one of the most-watched content formats of the summer. 

For brands, the goal is simple: be a natural, positive part of that haul. Whether through gifting with full editorial freedom or a paid integration that genuinely fits the creator’s style, the product needs to feel like a discovery, not a placement.

Setup and Transformation Content

Dorm room tours, desk organisation before-and-afters, and classroom transformation videos are highly watchable and put products in context rather than in isolation. The visual payoff of a beautifully organised space gives creators compelling content and gives brands a showcase that no product shot could replicate. Home, storage, stationery, and tech brands are particularly top-performing.

Day-in-the-Life and Routine Content

First day of school vlogs, morning routine content, and “week in my life at college” formats allow brands to integrate naturally into a narrative without the product feeling forced. This works especially well for food and drink, personal care, apparel, and everyday essentials.

Always-On Ambassador Programmes

For brands with genuine year-round relevance in the school and student space, back to school is the right moment to launch or deepen a long-term creator partnership. One-off seasonal activations work, but brands that build ongoing relationships with creators in the parent, student, and teacher communities see compounding returns – deeper creative alignment, growing audience trust, and content that builds on itself over time rather than starting from scratch each season.