Why Don’t PBS Stars Wild Kratts Have a Fanmail Address?
Clarification: This is not the Wild Kratts. I’m a guy complaining about the lack of a fanmail address for the Wild Kratts. Candace (in the comments below) has gotten a response to a Facebook inquiry, and listed the address there. Thanks.
5 years after I wrote this one of the posters below finally got a response from the Wild Kratts. So you don’t have to scroll through all the replies, here’s her answer:
UPDATE: 21 Feb 2017:
From the comments below:
Hello everyone, this is [the] same Mara as [in the] previous comment. I wanted to share the great news! It took a while after my daughter mailed the letter to the Wild Kratt Brothers but she actually received [a] postcard!!!! It has [a] picture of [the] brothers and (electronic) signatures from both brothers. My daughter was so thrilled!! I would post picture of it on here if I could. It was [this] address: PO box 475, Stowe, Vermont 05672
I can’t believe someone finally got a response.
See below for my original (and unanswered) kid’s letter to the Kratts.
Thanks for stopping by and be sure to check out my photography, my cool stickers and t-shirts, and my Youtube channel. Stay safe.
This has become one of my most popular posts of the last few years, demonstrating (I think) how well-served the Wild Kratts would be by an easily accessible fanmail address. Here’s a few of the emails I’ve gotten mistakenly addressed to Martin and Chris.
dear, chriss kratt I hope i spelled your name right. My name is (deleted) i am your bigist fan.if you dont mind would you send me a pick of you an a augograph on it. by the way i am 10 years old.aer crecher power suits real. if you can send a pick end it to (deleted).
hi ts (deleted) again i forgot something i woul like to be on your show i go tongo bye
Dear Kratt Brothers, My name is (deleted), and I wanted to ask you some questions that might help me with a project. If you could send me your email address, then I could send you a message in length. It would be great if you could get back to me ASAP. Thank you.
dear Martin & Chris. I love your t.v. show. I would like to see you & an animal .
Dear Martin&Chris. I would like to see a cheetah running. In Africa.
I would like a kids small&a kids medium in shirts.Boots to please.
And from a teacher looking for the address:
I’m a teacher and some of my students, as well as my son, wanted to write a nice letter to them. Very sad they don’t want their fans to contact them. Great show but terrible PR!!
I’ve got a 5 yr old who enjoys the Wild Kratts program on PBS. He watches it every day. He obsesses over the characters, pretends to be the animals, and talks about the show incessantly. He wants to visit the African Savannah so bad, I feel guilty for not having hauled him over there yet. His only complaint about the show is he’s never seen one about his favorite animal, the mountain lion.
As I imagine any well-meaning parent would do, I encouraged him to write to the Wild Kratts and suggest the topic. I figure if you can send fan mail to big-time (ahem) Hollywood stars, a couple dudes with a kid’s show on PBS should be at least as accessible, right? Wrong.
He spent 15 minutes laboring over his letter suggesting the Wild Kratts do a show on mountain lions, and this was the best address I could come up with. It came back fast enough for me to question if it had actually crossed the border into Canada.
If you search for “Wild Kratts Mailing Address” (most “Wild Kratts” queries, in fact) Google usually returns links for The Kratt Club – a fan club, where it states at the bottom of the page (after the disclaimer that they’re not affiliated with Martin and Chris) that “The Kratt Brothers do not have a current fan mail address or email address for fans to write to.” (Written in Comic Sans of course).
Further searching reveals a “Yahoo Answer” that claims the reason the Kratts don’t have a mailing address “might be because they don’t want millions of kids to send them fan mail.” I refuse to believe that. I’ve watched the show and the brothers come off as genuine. According to Wikipedia they each have kids of their own. I can’t believe that two dads so concerned about teaching kids the value of nature and wilderness in the modern world can be oblivious to kids’ needs to learn effective communication skills. They have trailers after episodes where kids help save animals and protect the environment. Writing letters is an effective way to accomplish both these actions from a distance. Why not let encourage kids to write to them? Writing promotes thinking, individual activity and action at an early and influential age. It teaches young people to speak up and attempt to try and change something.
I’d argue that without a mailing address, Wild Kratts is just another crappy TV show. Sure, kids can interact with the silly games at pbskids.org, and adults can get in touch with the production company to book appearances and promotional gigs, but no contact info for kids? Shame on you Chris and Martin.
Without a real address (or at least an easily located address for fanmail) I’ll do the next best thing. Here’s the letter in it’s entirety:
I understand with the popularity of the show Martin and Chris could easily be overwhelmed by fanmail, but c’mon, that’s not the real point. Pick 50 letters a week to respond to. Post the best ones on Facebook and tweet some responses to questions. Let this be a learning experience for both the Wild Kratts by being more in touch with their demographic and for the kids and fans of the show by letting them know their voices are heard.
I never told my boy the letter came back. He keeps asking when the episode about the mountain lion will be on the air. Luckily, we’ve started writing a story about a mountain lion… imagination beats television any day.
Good luck!