I live near East Aurora. My aunt submitted all our family's kids photos to them and a few of us ended up on boxes. Her kid is on the original Bubble Mower.
No money in it for her, I think she just thought it would be fun. I don't know how she even knew it was an option. We got paid though, like 20 something bucks per shoot (an hour or 2), and something like $100 bonus if you got on the box. I remember going to Toy's R Us to get the whole TMNT toy collection after this, or maybe it was the Field Explorer, I was on that too. My allergies were horrible that day but they used the photo anyway.
No, it is a reference to an episode of the Simpsons in which Bart uses a microphone of the sort the OP posted to trick people into thinking someone had fallen down the well.
(The episode itself is presumably inspired by the real-life incident.)