Friday, January 30, 2009
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Richard Tulley
1/26/09
Sotosky 3:15
Perfect Pleasure?
The cigarette industry is a multi-million dollar a year industry. The cigarette companies spend a huge amount of money on advertising each year. Though they are limited in the areas and ways they can advertise due to the passing of the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act by congress in April, 1970 (Wikipedia, sec. 4.4). This act banned the advertisement of cigarettes on radio and television. This leaves cigarette companies with little areas to advertise. Consequently the companies have spent millions to develop advertisements which will suit the small places where they can advertise like magazines and public places like gas stations and sports like nascar. The ad i have chosen to deconstruct is taken from a magazine that appeals to a younger audience.
This ad is for Newport cigarettes which are produced by Lorillard Tobacco Company. Newport cigarettes are the most popular brand of menthol cigarettes. This ad’s target audience would be fun-loving young adults. This is made clear by the young people who are featured in the ad and by the environment the people are in. It is unclear if the ad is meant to be for a male or female audience. I believe it is created to appeal to both sexes. The ad features a young, hot, and smoking girl dancing with a hansom young man in what appears to be a club or music venue. The young girl smoking could be implying to women that smoking is not unhealthy nor does it deter men from dancing with you. She appears to be having a great time with her male companion who obviously does not mind the girl smoking. The crowd surrounding the girl appears not to care that the girl is smoking either. This is contradictory to society because it is now illegal to smoke indoors whether it is a club or any business. Now you have to be at least fifty feet away from any exit to smoke. Though the pretty young women could also be appealing to men who think women who smoke are unattractive. I don’t think any guy would turn a dance with that girl down whether she is smoking or not.
The slogan in the ad, “fire it up”, is a short and catchy saying that is popular in a few different ways. This jingle could have been formed by taking the lines from popular songs and placing them in bold, bright, colorful font. The songs the slogan could have been taken from are “Light My Fire” by The Doors which was a hit song in 1967 but is still a very popular song today. The connection could be seen through the young people dancing in a club because they enjoy the music. “Light My Fire” is a very popular song that a young couple of smokers would enjoy dancing to. The Label on the, “Newport Pleasure”, suggests that it is a pleasure to smoke newport cigarettes
This ad was constructed by a team of highly paid professionals to make the unappealing activity of smoking look like a very appealing activity which many young, fun-loving, good looking people enjoy. In reality smoking has become more of a rejected habit in society which is looked down upon as being detrimental to your health and unattractive to the opposite sex. But this ad makes smoking look almost fun and cool and accepted by good looking young people.