Point-of-Sale Tobacco Ads Suck in Youth

It is no secret that Big Tobacco has young people in their sights. People who become smokers before age 18 are more likely to become lifetime smokers. The tobacco companies can be very successful in their efforts to attract young smokers. 43.7% of LGBT youth smoke, for instance - no doubt lured by the gay friendly advertising the tobacco companies put out in the gay media.

The tobacco companies have used all sorts of devices to cultivate young smokers. They used to have Joe Camel and Marlboro Miles. Now they have nicotine candy like Camel Snus. The FDA has issued regulations outlawing a lot of advertising and promotion efforts. The most basic form of promotion remains untouched: advertising at point-of-sale locations. A new study shows that such advertising has a special impact on young people.

Stanford University Medical School researchers say point-of-sale ads in places such as convenience stores, gas stations and small groceries are a major cause of teen smoking. Teens who frequently visited places with tobacco advertising were twice as likely to start smoking as teens who visited the locations less frequently. Frequency of advertising exposure was measured by multiplying the number of visits to stores by the number of tobacco labelled advertising and tchochkes at the stores. The study is to be published in the August issue of Pediatrics.

Banning point-of-sale advertising would be a direct hit against Big Tobacco and represent a substantial victory for anti-tobacco youth advocates. Tobacco companies spend big bucks on point-of-sale advertising. It accounts for 90% of their $12.5 billion marketing budget in 2006. The cigarette labelled items in stores is overwhelming and consist of things like clocks, trash cans and cash register mats. Tobacco companies know that point-of-sale advertising attracts people to smoke and normalizes the practice by juxtaposing its advertising with advertising for household items like dishwashing liquid and soup. Banning such advertising will lead to a substantial reduction in smoking rates for teens, which has already been declining in recent years.

I can only hope that the FDA takes the bull by the horns and bans tobacco advertising in stores. Undoubtedly the tobacco companies will declare that their free speech rights are violated. That is nothing compared to having our young peoples' lives violated.

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Keep track of the work Butt Out is doing by going to our website (www.butt-out.org/), friending us on Facebook (butt-outsanfrancisco) or by connecting with us on Twitter (twitter.com/buttoutsf).Butt Out is a project of Breathe California, funded by the San Francisco Tobacco Free Project, which works to get tobacco money out of LGBT community organizations in San Francisco. We also educate the public about the hazards of smoking and about smoking cessation.