Caught in Big Tobacco’s Web

Note: All references to the names of tobacco companies and their brands have been replaced with ******.

Countries like the Philippines have passed laws regulating the marketing and promotions of tobacco. But tobacco companies have been increasingly using the Internet to market their products, effectively sidestepping this laws. A recent case is ******’s sponsorship of the reunion concert of the popular Filipino music band, the Eraserheads.

Here are some links to stories and materials that detail this scheme by the tobacco companies, and the challenges anti-smoking advocates are facing. (There are several other materials on the Internet. Just Google “internet marketing tobacco.”)

* Ad exec calls for total tobacco ad ban now
* Break the tobacco marketing net — WHO
* Tobacco industry accused of delaying passage of picture-based health warning on cigarette packs
* Health alliance hits use of misleading descriptors in cigarette brands
* WHO Warns of ‘Tobacco Offensive’ Vs. Youths
* Pinoy Victims of Tobacco Push for Picture-Based Warning in Cigarette Packs
* Stop ‘Fronting’ for Tobacco Companies, Government Urged

How ****** Killed ‘Yosi Kadiri’

Tobacco Marketing — Where There’s Smoke, There’s Deception
It is well established that partial bans on tobacco advertising are ineffectual. The tobacco industry simply pours its energies (and its considerable financial resources) into other forms of promotion—sponsorship of sports events and beauty contests, promoting rock concerts or discos, distribution of free samples, placing their logos on t-shirts, backpacks and other items popular with children, sponsoring adventure contests such as the Egyptian one described above. In recent years the tobacco industry has avoided advertising bans in some countries by placing covert ads on the Internet.

Tobacco companies find new ways to advertise
Tobacco companies are very inventive when it comes to protecting their profits. They’re turning increasingly to the Internet, the email and even dance parties to market cigarettes to young people.

Internet Sales of Tobacco: Heading Off the New E-pidemic
Few consumer items are as well suited as tobacco products to profitable marketing, selling, and distributing via the internet . Several factors make selling cigarettes via the internet profitable.

Break the Tobacco Marketing Net
The more tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship that young people see and hear, the more likely they are to become tobacco users.

Smoke on the web – Tobacco Marketing’s Last Gasp?
With many advertising avenues closed, the internet is proving to be a valuable medium for tobacco companies, particularly with their youth-oriented audience. But they will have to tread cautiously

For Tobacco, Stealth Marketing Is the Norm
Tobacco companies, which are able to vastly outspend antitobacco groups, may still be winning the marketing wars. While tobacco companies have abandoned most conventional advertising, they are using other means to get their point across. Antismoking groups, on the other hand, are now struggling to find the money to maintain even a small-scale campaign.