Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Family
Children – img8728
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img4356
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img4357
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8729
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8730
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img9355
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8732
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img4372
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8731
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Guard Your Throat – img2670
When the general public began to grow more concerned about the ill effects of smoking in the first half of the twentieth century, the tobacco industry worked intensively on its advertising copy in order to reassure smokers as to the healthfulness and safety of cigarettes. The audacity of the industry was such that industry powerhouses weren’t satisfied with simply denying health concerns. Instead, they actually claimed health benefits. Brand X, Y, or Z claimed its cigarettes were “good for the throat,” provided “extra protection,” or could be smoked as a “prevention” against throat illness. Across the board, tobacco brands touted these ludicrous, false health claims.
The primary health concerns presented in the advertisements in the first half of the twentieth century revolved around non-fatal conditions like coughing and throat irritation. This approach served to lessen any fear regarding serious health concerns by choosing to instead concentrate on the less frightening side effects of smoking. For these ads, Big Tobacco employed an advertising technique known as “problem-solution” advertising; the advertisement provides the problem (coughing due to smoking, for example), as well as the solution (smoke brand X). Of course, the “solution” is deceptive, and many companies were ordered by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to discontinue printing certain advertisements. However, it wasn’t until 1938 that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) was officially granted the power to regulate advertising that was “unfair or deceptive” to consumers. Before that time, the FTC regulated advertisements insofar as they would harm competitors rather than consumers . The 1940s and 1950s saw great strides in regulation on health claims, but it also saw quick-witted tobacco companies able to alter a word here or there in order to avoid regulation. Tobacco companies claimed throat protection well into the 1950s.
Children – img8735
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img4380
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8733
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Children – img8734
Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the respectability of smoking as a part of normal family life, a perception often promulgated by the tobacco industry. Further, the images of youngsters tended to send a reassuring message to consumers about the healthfulness of the product, representing purity, vibrancy, and life – concepts which can be dangerous when tied to tobacco products. Finally, these depictions of children were an obvious ploy to attract females to smoking as part of the industry’s campaign to expand the pool of women smokers.
Calms your Nerves – img3680
In a prime example of marketing wizardry, tobacco advertisements have simultaneously presented cigarettes as both sedatives and stimulants. Ads worked to convince consumers that cigarettes would calm the smoker when he felt nervous, or pep him up when he felt sluggish. This theme features ad campaigns from a variety of cigarette brands, all proclaiming cigarettes to be sedatives. Many of the ads in this theme are for Camel cigarettes, and claimed that only Camel cigarettes “do not upset your nerves.” This claim implied that other cigarette brands are stimulants and do cause people to get the jitters, but Camels are the exception. Though Camel was prolific in their anti-nerves campaigns in the 1930s, they were certainly not the only tobacco brand to approach this advertising technique, nor the first.
In 1918, Girard cigars claimed that their cigar “never gets on your nerves,” a slogan which Camel also used over a decade later in 1933. Girard’s ads pose questions that many readers would invariably answer in the affirmative: “Are you easily irritated? Easily annoyed? Do children get on your nerves? Do you fly off the handle and then feel ashamed of yourself?” The ad forces most readers to question their behavior and convinces them that they need intervention, when prior to reading the ad, they felt nothing was wrong. The ad posits Girard as at least one thing that won’t cause anxiety and as the solution to the problems people never even knew they had.
Other ads positioned also their products as relaxing agents. A 1929 ad for Taretyon cigarettes claims that “Tareytons are the choice of busy, active people. People whose work requires steady nerves.” Similarly, many of Camel’s ads explain that people in high pressure situations can’t afford to feel nervous or to have shaky hands (sharpshooters, circus flyers, salesmen, surgeons). The ads don’t provide the reader with the opportunity to think that avoiding cigarettes altogether would be an option if they were worried about the nervous effects of smoking; Instead, Camels are presented as the only “solution” to the nicotine-jolt problem. The ads target a wide variety of audiences, both male and female, young and old, daredevil and housewife. Camel ensures that everyone feels the need for a Camel fix, siting common fidgets like drumming one’s fingers, tapping one’s foot, jingling one’s keys, and even doodling as signs that someone has “jangled nerves.”
Still more brands took the anti-anxiety approach in their ads. In 1933, Lucky Strike advertised that “to anxiety – I bring relief, to distress – I bring courage.” One such ad features a man sitting nervously in the waiting room of a dentist’s office as a woman offers him a Lucky Strike to ease his nerves. Similarly, a 1929 ad for Spud cigarettes poses the question: “Do you smoke away anxiety?” Presuming you answered yes, the ad explains, “then you’ll appreciate Spud’s greater coolness.” The 1938 “Let up – Light up a Camel” campaign explained that “people with work to do break nerve tension” with Camels, and that “smokers find that Camel’s costlier tobaccos are soothing to the nerves!” Even 20 years later, in 1959, King Sano cigars advertised that “the man under pressure owes himself the utter luxury of the new ‘soft smoke’ King Sano.”
Also of note, many of these ads claim that Camels provide their smokers with “healthy nerves,” misleadingly implying that Camel cigarettes themselves are healthy.
Early Black Ads – img12185
As World War II came to a close, tobacco companies needed to expand to “new” markets in order to maintain prosperity. At this point, they began issuing mass marketing efforts targeting African Americans. Whereas there was minor advertising in weekly African Americans newspapers prior to the war, scholars cite a number of post-war changes as the sources for the surge in market expansion, mainly the growth in urban migration and the steadily increasing incomes of African Americans in the 1940s (1). One scholar explains that “between 1920 and 1943, the annual income of African Americans increased threefold, from $3 billion to more than $10 billion,” making the population an increasingly appealing demographic for the tobacco industry (2). Indeed, advertising and marketing magazines published many articles at the time describing the profitable “emerging Negro market.” One such article from 1944, for example, was titled, “The American Negro—An ‘Export’ Market at Home” (3). A subsequent article printed a year later provided a table depicting “How Negroes Spent Their Incomes, 1920-1943 (4). The table revealed that the amount of money African Americans spent on tobacco products increased six-fold from 1920 to 1943.
Perhaps the catalyzing force in the tobacco industry’s foray into African American targeting came in the form of emerging advertising avenues that could be used to target African American populations without alienating whites; the 1940s saw the introduction of a number of glossy monthly magazines including Negro Digest (1942, renamed Black World), Ebony (1945) and Negro Achievements (1947, renamed Sepia). These mass-media publications were much more attractive to advertisers than the African American daily newspapers of the pre-war era, with glossy pages and a larger national distribution. The magazines, because they were intended for a purely African American audience, also provided advertisers with an opportunity to run ads featuring African American models away from the eyes of white consumers.
Internal tobacco industry documents reveal the massive development of the African American market in the 1940s and its impact on the tobacco industry. Public Relations firms specializing in targeting African American populations sent materials to the major tobacco companies hoping to secure business partnerships. One PR firm, in correspondence with RJ Reynolds in 1949, reminded the company that, “The negro market is a big one. I sincerely hope that I may have the opportunity [sic] of helping to further cultivate it for you” (5).
The major tobacco companies all made inroads on the “Negro market” in the ‘40s and ‘50s. Indeed, before the invent of such avenues, in the first decades of the twentieth century, the only ads featuring African Americans were racist advertisements using black caricatures, a striking contrast to the depictions seen in African American publications from the late 1940s to early 1950s, which featured African American models as professionals, students, and famous athletes. An advertising trade magazine, Printer’s Ink, described how, in 1947, the American Tobacco Company “entered the Negro market with a series of Famous Firsts about Negroes that were eye-openers to many in advertising” (6). The article describes the campaign content as telling “the history of some of the outstanding achievements of the Negroes,” most of which, according to the article, “were little known to students of the race.” Examples of these spotlights included Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver, and “some of the modern Negro notables.” The Printer’s Ink article explains that the campaign intends to market cigarettes to African Americans by demonstrating “to the Negro that his race has accomplished many things.”
Tobacco advertising methods targeting African Americans shifted in the late 1950s, 60s, and 70s with the rise of the Civil Rights movement, and just as there was economic and market pressure in the 1940s to increase marketing efforts to African Americans, the 1970s and 1980s sparked resurgence in these efforts. An R.J. Reynolds document from 1969, for example, marks an increase in “Negro purchasing power” from 3 billion in 1940 to 32 billion in 1970. At this point, in order to refocus attention on the African American population and strengthen their ties to the community, tobacco companies worked on promotional campaigns, which funded key organizations such as the NAACP, the National Urban League, and the United Negro College Fund. An internal Brown & Williamson document declares that the “relatively small and often tight knit community can work to B&W’s marketing advantage if exploited properly. Peer pressure plays a more important role in many phases of life in the minority community. Therefore, dominance of the market place and the community environment is necessary to successfully increase sales there” (7).
As the industry began sponsoring African American institutions and charities, they also shifted their print advertising techniques to reflect the changing political climate. Increasingly, models wearing “naturals” or Afros began popping up in ads for Newport, L&M, Kent, Kool, and many more. A Kent ad from 1971 shows a man and a woman, both wearing Afros, talking on the phone together and smoking cigarettes, the slogan “Rap’n Kent” underneath.
One scholar describes advertisements from the early 1960s as portraying a “racially desegregated society in which the discerning tastes and values of black consumers were highlighted” (3). But she notes a shift with the emergence of Black Power, in which ads were able to latch onto the Black Nationalism movement while completely avoiding the political ideology therein. Instead, the ads worked at “selling soul,” and “invoked themes of black pride, solidarity, and “soul style.” Indeed, a Viceroy ad campaign from 1970 demonstrates a carefully crafted combination of both approaches. One ad from the campaign shows a stylish couple – the man in a suit and the woman in a yellow mod mini-dress – shopping at an outdoor art boutique while smoking. The caption reads, “Their collection? It’s fun to build on. Their apartment looks like a gallery. With everything from Neo-Afro realism to their child’s finger painting. Their cigarettes? Viceroy. They won’t settle for anything less. It’s a matter of taste.” This ad exemplifies the industry’s blatant attempts at exploiting Black Nationalism. An internal Brown & Williamson document from 1969 reveals that tobacco companies were indeed using this theme to market cigarettes: “The desire for blackness, or soul, as part of solving their identity crisis is something that must be understood. A sense of identity is being accentuated because today, as never before, Negroes are taking pride in themselves” (8). Viceroy, like many of the other leading brands, also capitalized on this “soul” movement. Another ad from the same series features four African Americans at a nightclub enjoying drinks and cigarettes while listening to a musician. White people sit in the background enjoying the same music. The caption for this ad reads, “Their sounds? They like ‘em heavy. And with soul. The music not only has to say something. It has to move.”
At this time, menthols also emerged as a cigarette targeting African-Americans. Whereas in the past, menthol cigarettes had been advertised to the general population as an occasional cigarette to smoke when sick or suffering from smoker’s cough, the 1960s brought along the beginnings of a different image for the menthol cigarette. In 1969 alone, Lorillard increased its “Negro market budget” by 87% over 1968 due to the introduction of its menthol cigarette, Newport, to the African American market. Likewise, British American Tobacco doubled their budget from 1968 to 1969 in order to increase African-American radio station coverage for its menthol cigarette, Kool, as well as for Viceroy, which targeted African American stations (8). Today, over 70% of African-American smokers smoke menthols as opposed to only 35% of white smokers (9).
1. Walker, Susannah. “Black Dollar Power:” Susannah Walker. (University of Chicago Press, Jul 15, 2009 )
2. Walker, Susannah. “Style & Status: Selling Beauty to African American Women, 1920-1975”
3. Sullivan, David J. “The American Negro—An ‘Export’ Market at Home!” Printer’s Ink; 208:3. 21 July 1944:90.
4 Sullivan, David J. “How Negroes Spent Their Incomes, 1920-1943.” Sales Management. 15 June 1945.
5. “Thank You Very Much For Your Letter of the 23rd.” RJ Reynolds. 31 March 1949. http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/bwz79d00
6. “—No Title—.” American Tobacco. 26 Nov 1948. http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/vaj41a00
7. “Discussion Paper: Total Minority Marketing Plan,” 7 Sept 1984. Http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/dmf41f00
8. “A Study of Ethnic Markets.” R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. Sept 1969. http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/paq76b00
9. Gardiner, Phillip S. “The African Americanization of menthol cigarette use in the United States.” Nicotine & Tobacco Research Vol.6 Supp. 1. Feb 2004.
