Wholly Smokes Read online

  For a time, GST Foods attempted to soften the blow, by including not one warning, but two:

  THE SURGEON GENERAL HAS DETERMINED THAT CIGARETTE SMOKING IS HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH.

  OF COURSE, THE SURGEON GENERAL WORKS FOR THE GOVERNMENT. AND WE ALL KNOW THE GOVERNMENT NEVER LIES TO US.

  Naturally, the Surgeon General’s office took a dim view of this. There was talk of new harsher legislation. Finally, GST agreed to display the government warning without commentary.

  The answer was a series of 1980s ads, seen in magazines and on billboards, that tried to make health warnings somehow irrelevant. A typical ad would show a group of young, healthy, athletic people of both sexes having active fun – water polo or touch football or snowball fights – in the healthy intimacy of contact sports. They were laughing like lunatics. Somewhere far down the page, far below them, lurked the ominous white warning label from the Surgeon General. But all of the people in the ad were laughing, laughing with their eyes closed, and so unable to see the offensive warning label at their feet.

  Come join us, was the subliminal message. Come join the fun. Close your eyes to that abominable warning. It’s not known whether anyone got the message, but GST cigarette sales continued to rise.

  Puff Love

  By the mid-1990s it was clear that many of the old marketing ideas no longer won customers. The tobacco world was shrinking. Instead of mass marketing, maybe it was time to invent new products, to target smaller, individual markets: grandparents, teens, health-conscious young adults, working mothers, and so on.

  One ad, aimed at young middle-class urban adults, showed a healthy young couple in expensive outdoors clothes lashing a canoe on top of their Jeep Grand Cherokee. It was no longer possible to show them actually smoking, but a large red cigarette pack floated in the air near them. The cigarette was called Moccasin. “Remember Moccasin,” said the headline. “The noble red man’s gift of golden tobacco.” (Around the company, this ad became known as Bury My Lung at Wounded Knee.)

  The same principle was applied to other groups. Senior citizens who wanted to save money could turn to Cheap Jack brand (“All the flavor, half the price, no nonsense.”). Working mothers might relax at the kitchen table, inhaling My Break cigarettes. Women in fashionable jogging clothes might light up Lungs of Steel cigarettes. There would be a brand created especially for every conceivable consumer group.

  It was Dwight Badcock who suggested a brand for kids.

  His confidential internal memo put it bluntly:

  I see one huge, unexploited target market, largely ignored by our competitors, but ready for us. This is the youth market.

  Call me crazy, but I say this apple is ripe for plucking.

  Ask yourself: Why does the idea of kids smoking have such a negative image today? After all, kids have always smoked. Many of you probably smoked as a kid. It did you no harm.

  Who says smoking is bad for kids? A few weak-minded politicians, a few spoil-sport doctors, but mainly those mean-spirited groups who simply want to ban something. They’re desperately afraid that someone, somewhere, might be enjoying something. Early in our century they banned alcohol. Today they’re after tobacco, but where will they stop? Will they want to ban coffee and tea? Will they seek FDA regulation of chocolate ice cream?

  Make no mistake, this is our fight for life. If we do nothing, if we hold still for it, our enemies will shut us down. It’s time to take a stand and fight back. It’s time for us to say, Yes, we are selling cigarettes to kids, and so what? You think we don’t care about our kids? We love them, but we don’t want to shield them from the real world. It’s time to let them step up to the plate and experience some tough love. Some Puff Love.

  That’s what we’ll call our new campaign: OPERATION PUFF LOVE. Through it, we intend to sell far more than cigarettes. We can sell the GST concept, the entire GST family of friendly products.

  Call me crazy, but I think this just might work.

  Some members of the board did indeed call him crazy (later they would wonder if he wasn’t showing the first signs of his tragic illness). But others looked upon Dwight’s “madness” as nothing short of genius. In any case, they all went along with Operation Puff Love.

  This campaign eventually divided the target market into three groups, ages five to ten, ten to fourteen, and fourteen to eighteen. These corresponded closely to grade school, middle or junior high, and high school. A completely different approach was mapped out for each group.

  The Group One Campaign: Cap and Snap

  Kids in Group One, ages five to ten, were most easily influenced by animated cartoons. What was needed was an endorsement of the product by a cartoon character.

  For a time, the GST marketing people hoped the character would be Pinocchio. They imagined showing cuts from the Disney movie, namely, those terrific scenes where the boys are taken to an island with cigars growing on trees (naturally they would leave out the part where the boys get sick or turn into donkeys).

  A vain hope in any case, for there was no way to get the Disney people to go along with such a scheme. So GST decided instead to start from scratch with its own unique cartoon hero. Heroes, rather, for there must be one for boys and one for girls.

  The boys would be introduced to Cap’n Savage, a feisty little pirate who gets into numerous scrapes but always vanquishes his gigantic opponents. Any boy who likes violence – and what boy doesn’t? – will love Cap’n Savage.

  The girls wouldbe introduced to Snapdragon, a lovable little pink-and-lavender dragon who breathes flowers instead of fire. Any girl who likes cuddly pet toys – ponies or unicorns – would love little Snapdragon.

  The plan was to feature each character in a regular Saturday morning TV show without mentioning the product. Later, once younger children had become “imprinted” upon the character, ready to buy anything it stood for, it would be time to introduce a compendium of tie-in products: toys, clothes, food, and, almost as an afterthought, cigarettes – the tobacco connection – though not on broadcast TV, of course.

  Dwight’s confidential internal memo painted a vivid picture:

  We will be marketing a full range of irresistible products: tote bags, jeans, lunch boxes, sand pails, crayons, coloring books, comics, t-shirts, sweat-suits, sneakers with lights, pajama bags, in-line skates, radios, just about anything kids ever touch. We’ll be talking to Nintendo and Sega about licensing possible video games.

  Try to picture the little boy of next year. He will get up in his Cap’n Savage pajamas, and brush his teeth with his Cap’n Savage toothbrush. He’ll breakfast on Cap’n Savage cereal, put on his Cap’n Savage sneakers, his Cap’n Savage jeans, and his Cap’n Savage sweatshirt. He will carry his Cap’n Savage lunchbox to school, where he will use his Cap’n Savage crayons and his Cap’n Savage calculator. And maybe out on the playground, he and his friends will light up a Cap’n Savage, the great tastin’ sport cigarette.

  The little girl of next year will like-wise be surrounded with Snapdragon products, from the moment she gets up in her Snapdragon pajamas, all through the day. Snapdragon dolls, Snapdragon t-shirts, Snapdragon breakfast food, Snapdragon songs, and so on, right up to the moment on the playground when, we hope, she and her friends light up a Snapdragon, the fashion fun cigarette.

  Thus we’ll be selling not one product, but a whole family of interlocked products. The Saturday cartoons themselves will earn a modest amount, but really they’ll be half-hour commercials for all our Cap’n Savage and Snapdragon products. We’ll have Cap dolls and Snap dolls, plus their full range of accessories. To this we can add their friends plus their accessories. Right now a top-shelf toy manufacturer is working up designs for a full complement of clothes, jewelry, tampons, weapons, and so on. What little girl will be able to resist Snapdragon’s tiny purse, with its cute little pack of Snapdragon cigarettes!

  The company was of course aware of one snag: no tobacco product could be mentioned on commercial broadcast or cable TV. The Saturday mo
rning broadcasts (Cap’n Savage, Scourge of the Caribbean, and My Little Snapdragon) must remain forever free of tobacco advertising.

  Oddly enough, there were no such restrictions on school cable TV. Kids at school could watch whatever an advertiser wanted to show them, at least on the Rousseau Channel. This privately funded cable channel, available only in schools, was already a pipeline into little minds for heavy advertising campaigns.

  This was possible because the Rousseau Cable Company provided the schools with everything – the TV monitors, the VCRs, the cable, the satellite time – plus hours of free educational programming. In return, Rousseau only asked to be allowed to slip in a few minutes of commercials throughout the school day. So far they’d been selling only fast food, candy bars, sneakers, games, toys, movie promotional tie-ins for movies – all the usual kid stuff. But now GST could use the Rousseau Channel for direct smoking commercials.

  The Rousseau Cable Company could of course be counted on to cooperate with GST, because Rousseau was a wholly-owned subsidiary of GST. But would the schools cooperate? As Dwight put it:

  Naturally any school can refuse these commercials. If they do so, however, the Rousseau Cable Company will take back its TV monitors and VCRs, rip out its cable, and effectively black out school television. There will be nothing to keep the kids quiet with. Once teachers realize that, they’ll play ball.

  It was about this time that board members began noticing Dwight Badcock’s increasingly eccentric behavior:

  Dwight came into the conference room wearing a patch over one eye and a white bandanna tied over his head, and waving a cutlass.

  “I’m Cap’n Savage,” he said. “Scourge of the Caribbean!”

  We all applauded. He raised the cut-lass and brought it down – Wham! – chopping a notch in the conference table. We applauded again. The more outrageous he got, the more we loved it.

  Up to a point. Dwight turned up the next day in the same regalia, and the day after that. When it went on for a week, we began to get worried.

  The Group Two Campaign: Slamdunk and Slapshot

  Kids in Group Two, ages ten to fourteen, were not so easily influenced by cartoon characters. No doubt R. J. Reynolds did well enough with their Old Joe the Camel character, just the kind of worthless lout that early teens could identify with, but GST was aiming for something even more effective.

  Research showed that members of this cohort related far more strongly to three things: mindless rock music, athletics, and violence. Especially violence. As a memo from the marketing director explained:

  We’ve been working with focus groups to develop a product image. Musical references, we felt, are too quickly out of date. We will of course rely on videos with music – gangsta rap especially – but our main thrust should be towards athletics and violence. We suggest two possible product names: Slamdunk or Slapshot.

  For a further focus group study, we removed the blackboard from a classroom and replaced it with a two-way mirror. Seatedbehindit, abattery of motivational psychologists were able to study every nuance of the behavior of real kids in a real classroom.

  We then showed the kids violent videos featuring both product names. The boys seemed generally to prefer Slapshot. In later discussions, they agreed they would like to smoke a cigarette with that name.

  Girls showed less interest in either name. Indeed, our team found them paying little attention to the screen violence. Instead, they spent the time discussing dates and nail polish, yawning, and even doing schoolwork. Clearly, we need to do a lot of work in this area.

  We see ourselves putting together an ad with a dozen violent scenes – hockey, football, karate, etc. We would give prominence to Dennis Rodman kicking a cameraman, Mike Tyson biting the famous ear, and the like. Or how about O.J. Simpson demonstrating a knife? (It’s necessary to tread carefully here – we can’t imply an athletic endorsement.)

  Dwight Badcock (as Cap’n Savage) 1996

  The Group Three Campaign: Streetlife

  The campaign for the hearts and minds of high school kids was relentless. Dwight laid it all out at a board meeting (recorded on video tape):

  DWIGHT (wearing Cap’n Savage regalia): High school has to stay our main target. Much more important than the tiny tots.

  BOARD MEMBER: I suppose you have qualms about marketing to the tiny tots.

  DWIGHT: Naturally. Let’s face it, they have very little disposable income. We need to crack the teen market – the kids with real money.

  For the teens, we emphasize how cigarettes can make you mysterious and interesting, and even improve your complexion and hair. Our provisional name is Street-Life. We’ll package them in a shiny black flip-top box – like black leather – with the name scrawled across it in Dayglo letters, kind of a cross between a spray-painted graffito and a neon sign. With a slogan like NOW YOU SMOKIN’!

  BOARD MEMBER: I like the slogan. How do we deliver our message?

  DWIGHT: We’ll hit them all day, beginning with the school buses. We’ll put ads all over the sides of buses. Just think of a kid standing waiting for the bus, and here it rolls in, bringing our message up at eye level.

  BOARD MEMBER: Is that legal?

  DWIGHT: Why not? It worked for 7-Up at Colorado Springs, why not for us in other towns? And we also want to place more ads inside the bus. Like this (holds up a placard):

  NO SMOKING

  BUT IF YOU COULD LIGHT UP,

  WOULDN’T YOU RATHER TRY

  STREETLIFE?

  BOARD MEMBER: What about kids who don’t ride the bus?

  DWIGHT (lifts the eyepatch to rub his eye): They probably smoke already. But don’t worry, we’re saturating the school, too. The idea is to place ads on every surface – the halls, lunchrooms, lockers, wherever kids look. Mirrors for instance: we’re placing mirrors with ads printed across them inside every kid’s locker door. What high school kid can pass up a mirror?

  BOARD MEMBER: Good thinking.

  What about the john? That has mirrors, and they probably do their smoking there, right?

  DWIGHT: Yes, the restrooms are special sanctuaries for our ads. The boys’ ads will show some cool, tough dudes smoking. We can use movie posters of James Dean, Humphrey Bogart, Robert Mitchum – and we can put speech balloons over their heads saying, “Don’t smoke in here. But if you do, try STREETLIFE.” Or one in the stalls, saying, “Whatever you’re doing in here, you can do it better with STREETLIFE.” In the girls’ john, the ad can show some anorexic model, more or less telling them “If I didn’t smoke STREETLIFE, I’d weigh 400 pounds!”

  BOARD MEMBER: Ingenious! I suppose there’ll be lunchroom ads?

  DWIGHT: Naturally. There are so many surfaces in a lunchroom. We see huge billboards on the walls, ads embedded in table surfaces and trays, printedon napkins, and of course paper placemats.

  BOARD MEMBER: What about the gym?

  DWIGHT: We have to be careful with gyms and sports fields. The problem is, parents come to watch Junior play b-ball and notice the ads. Next thing you know, they’re phoning the school board. In any case, our real coverage will be in the classroom materials. Once you get the teacher to pass out your brochures as textbooks, it just doesn’t get any better. In a sense, the teacher is endorsing the product. The kids are in no position to argue, even if they wanted to. So we’re providing free book jackets, free tests, free charts, free books and videos, free everything. Even better than free. If a school co-operates, they get a little bonus check at the end of the year.

  BOARD MEMBER: Amazing.

  DWIGHT: We’re of course planning a full range of teaching materials. That means books, pamphlets, charts, posters, videos, slide presentations.

  This chart, for use in diversity appreciation courses, emphasizes the Native American contribution to our culture – so many of the products kids appreciate, like potatoes, corn, and tobacco. They will be represented here by the brands kids know and love: Heidi-Ho potato chips, Chompitos corn chips, and of course STREETLIFE cigarettes.
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  And here’s an excerpt from our pamphlet, Your Nutrition:

  FACT: Smoking does keep your weight down. In clinical tests, people who smoked STREETLIFE weighed up to TEN POUNDS LESS than those who refrained from smoking. The non-smokers typically satisfied their cravings with fats and sweets, which often lead to skin problems, heart disease and diabetes.

  And over here’s a math problem, figuringhow much tax the government gouges out of apack of cigarettes. Teens always like to ponder how the government is out to get them.

  For those kids already smoking STREETLIFE, we’ll of course be offeringsales incentives. They can save our coupons and get all kinds of badass stuff with our logo: lighters, leather jackets, bandannas, boot holsters, special tattoos, jewelry to be worn in the nose, tongue, nipples, and so on.

  BOARD MEMBER: What about music?

  DWIGHT: We’ve created a music video that says it all.

  THE MUSIC VIDEO (shows a popular rap group wearing caps, billowing t-shirts, baggy shorts, and shoes an inch thick. They flap their elbows and knees, glower at the camera, and periodically twist their hands into grotesque, spastic-looking gang signs. The logo on everything, like the huge graffito in the background, says, STREETLIFE):