'Illegal cigarette' awareness campaign may get more people smoking

When South Africa took the step to ban cigarette advertising, it was with the hope that the adoption of smoking would end. So, our televisions and movie screens were stripped of beautiful, young, successful and sporty people lighting up a cigarette and enjoying a 'healthy' life.

Slowly the images of the glorious smoking lifestyle faded away; the cigarette was no longer in the upper echelon of our awareness. Relegated to point of sale, pack innovation, permission-based marketing and other dark marketing practices they have, however, persevered. And now they're back.
Consider cigarettes again

Then, this year, cigarette communication has once again taken centre stage, forcing people to consider cigarettes again - perhaps not to the same degree as when B&H commercials promoting skiing and smoking filled the airwaves or when the Marlboro Man made us want to ride off into the sunset on our horse - but they have made it back onto the billboards and interrupted our daily journeys once again, even if its message is somewhat more sinister.

Instead of the lifestyle positioning, the message is all ominous: "Buying Illegal Cigarettes Funds Organised Crime!"

Pamphlets, print ads and billboards all raise the profile of the tobacco product once more, in what is probably a loophole in the legislation overseeing advertising-restricted products.

While there is no recognisable brand to be seen, the Tobacco Institute of South Africa has taken centre stage in communicating that consumers who buy a pack of cigarettes for under R14.50 are probably buying illegal cigarettes, and so are more than likely supporting organised crime syndicates who use the profits of illegal cigarettes to fund their dastardly deeds.