RJR Nabisco's cartoon camel promotes camel cigarettes to children

Abstract

<h3>Objectives.</h3> —To determine if RJR Nabisco's cartoon-theme advertising is more effective in promoting Camel cigarettes to children or to adults. To determine if children see, remember, and are influenced by cigarette advertising. <h3>Design.</h3> —Use of four standard marketing measures to compare the effects of Camel's Old Joe cartoon advertising on children and adults. <h3>Subjects.</h3> —High school students, grades 9 through 12, from five regions of the United States, and adults, aged 21 years and over, from Massachusetts. <h3>Outcome Measures.</h3> —Recognition of Camel's Old Joe cartoon character, product and brand name recall, brand preference, appeal of advertising themes. <h3>Results.</h3> —Children were more likely to report prior exposure to the Old Joe cartoon character (97.7% vs 72.2%;<i>P</i>&lt;.0001). Children were better able to identify the type of product being advertised (97.5% vs 67.0%;<i>P</i>&lt;.0001) and the Camel cigarette brand name (93.6% vs 57.7%;<i>P</i>&lt;.0001). Children also found the Camel cigarette advertisements more appealing (<i>P</i>&lt;.0001). Camel's share of the illegal children's cigarette market segment has increased from 0.5% to 32.8%, representing sales estimated at $476 million per year. <h3>Conclusion.</h3> —Old Joe Camel cartoon advertisements are far more successful at marketing Camel cigarettes to children than to adults. This finding is consistent with tobacco industry documents that indicate that a major function of tobacco advertising is to promote and maintain tobacco addiction among children. (<i>JAMA</i>1991;266:3149-3153)