Tobacco Industry Initiatives on Youth Smoking

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Tobacco Industry Initiatives on Youth Smoking

• Clive Bates
• Action on Smoking and Health

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Tobacco Industry Youth Smoking Initiatives

• 3 main themes
• Responsible marketing
• Only adults should smoke
• Reduce access to cigarettes

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Tobacco Industry Youth Smoking Initiatives

• Excellent PR
• Promotes laissez faire for adults
• Plays well in the media and politics
• Leaves critics disorientated
• Offers links to governments
• Impossible problem for regulators
• AND WILL NOT WORK!

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Market realities

• The younger smoker is of pre-eminent
  importance significant in numbers, lead in to
  prime market, starts brand preference
  patterning.
• Brown Williamson (BAT), 1974

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Market realities

• The ability to attract new smokers and develop
  them into a young adult franchise is key to brand
  development.
• Philip Morris, Five-Year Trends 1988-1992

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Reaching young people

• In the young smoker's mind, a cigarette falls
  into the same category with wine, beer, shaving,
  wearing a bra (or purposely not wearing one),
  declaration of independence and striving for
  self-identity.... Thus, an attempt to reach young
  smokers, starters, should be based, among others,
  on the following major parameters
• Ted Bates agency, New York

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A symbol of growing up

• Present the cigarette as one of the few
  initiations into the adult world.
• Present the cigarette as part of the illicit
  pleasure category of products and activities.
• In your ads create a situation taken from the
  day-to-day life of the young smoker but in an
  elegant manner have this situation touch on the
  basic symbols of the growing-up, maturity
  process.
• To the best of your ability, (considering some
  legal constraints), relate the cigarette to pot,
  wine, beer, sex, etc.

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1. International marketing standards
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International marketing standards

• reasonable measures should be taken to ensure
  that the promotion and distribution of tobacco
  products is
• directed at adult smokers and not at youth
• consistent with the principle of informed adult
  choice

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International marketing standards

• Promotional content
• Media usage restrictions
• Promotion and event standards
• Sampling
• Sponsorship
• Packaging

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Impossible to divide teenagers from adults

• Q. Audrey Wise MP.
• Can you give us any examples of things you would
  not put in in case they attracted the 14 to 15
  year olds? You have rock, cult, bikes, cars and
  all sorts of things 14 and 15 year old males
  seem to be just as interested as 18 year olds.
  How do your adverts differ?
•  
• Paul Bainsfair, Chairman of a tobacco advertising
  agency.
• Perhaps if I say that it is common sense
  that there is going to be an overlap. Some
  15-year olds are going to be more sophisticated
  than others. It is impossible to say that
  something that appeals to an 18 year old will not
  appeal to a 15 year old. If that is what you are
  getting at, obviously you are right.

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Effect of partial bans

• .comprehensive advertising bans can reduce
  tobacco consumption A limited set of advertising
  bans will not reduce the total level of
  advertising expenditure but will simply result in
  substitution to the remaining non-banned media
• (Saffer and Chaloupka, 2000)
• JUDGE IT BY WHAT IS PERMITTED RATHER THAN WHAT IS
  BANNED

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"We . believe that the multinationals' strategy
is proactive and is a way to improve their image.
the multinationals could be trying to counter a
number of proposals that the WHO has been working
on to curb the amount of cigarettes that are
consumed on an international level."One would
think that the elimination of certain marketing
practices would effectively decrease advertising
spending and hence increase margins, however we
believe the modest amount the multinationals
actually spend on these types of practices will
be redirected into other types of marketing
promotions i.e., point of sale activity.
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Purpose avoid legislation

• we refined the objective of a juvenile
  initiative program as follows Maintain and
  proactively protect our ability to advertise,
  promote and market our products via a juvenile
  initiative.
• Cathy Leiber, Philip Morris International,
  1995

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2. Anti-smoking campaigns
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Only adults should smoke

• Theyre hypocritical, you know which teachers
  smoke, we all know which teachers smoke yet they
  say to us, Dont smoke, its disgusting.
  Stinking of fags. Its just listening to their
  opinion really. People cant tell you not to
  smoke if they smoke themselves.
• Focus group 14-15 year girls

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Success reduction in legislation

• As we discussed, the ultimate means for
  determining the success of this program will be
• 1) A reduction in legislation introduced and
  passed restricting or banning our sales and
  marketing activities
• 2) Passage of legislation favorable to the
  industry
• 3) greater support from business, parent, and
  teacher groups.
• Joshua Slavitt, Philip Morris, Tobacco
  Industry Youth Initiative, 1991

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Mobilise boring figures of adult-imposed authority

• mobilise teachers, parents, Government and
  public health bodies in an integrated
  communications campaign with effective messages
• BAT, 2000

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Parents, teachers, and public health bodies?
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BAT in Malaysia
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Ukraine innocence against smoking
I dont have time to smoke (Kiev, Ukraine)
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3. Access initiatives
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Underage access

• If we can frame proactive legislation or other
  kinds of action on the Youth Access issuewe will
  be protecting our industry for decades to come.
• Philip Morris, 1995

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Someone will get them for you

• No matter how old you are, someone will get
  them for you.
• 13-14 year old girl, smokers, Birmingham
• Buyers Rights, you get two from twenty and one
  from ten
• Year 9 boys, smokers. Southampton

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Makes you want them more

• That would make people want them moreits the
  idea that youre not supposed to have them Im
  not supposed to touch that, so Im going to go
  and get some
• 13-14 year old girls, non-smokers, Newcastle

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Russia the perfect YSP ad?
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Easily defeated ID cards

• About the CitizenCard
• I want an ID card so I can say Im a bit older
  so I can go and buy fags, instead of having to
  wait for ages for people to go into the shop and
  get them for me.
• If you go into the back of your FHM a lad
  magazine, you can send away for an IDfor 20
  you can get the kitmakes about 3 IDs,
  hologrammed, laminated, the lot! My mate at
  school has got one and it looks really
  realistic. 13-14 year old boys, smokers,
  Southampton

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Tobacco Industry Youth Smoking Initiatives

• Self-serving PR
• Resist legislation and appear to be co-operating
• Frame the issue as a kids problem
• Focus on adults helps sell to kids play on
  adult aspiration and rebellion
• Call for more research but ignore existing
  research
• Advocate things that dont work (but resist
  things that do)

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Conclusion

• Tobacco industry should withdraw its youth
  smoking initiatives
• Governments should avoid involvement with the
  tobacco industrys youth smoking initiatives
• Public health should not fall into youth
  prevention traps