Archive for the ‘Cigarette advertising’ Category
JPS and those beautiful people
John Player Special is back on the streets in Germany with this oh-so-cool image of man and woman in a vintage convertible. The spirit of freedom comes through the tagline ‘always free, never pointless’. No, there is a real point to smoking. Never pointless, addictive and lethal. 
Meanwhile, Lucky Strike continues the case for tobacco as coffee (right). This time the strike-out of the text changes the meaning from being unapologetic or maybe audacious about the different taste to three (packets) that taste different (because of where the tobacco was grown). Get me the ad agency’s number!
Tobacco is now like coffee
Those of us who drink coffee do so with some idea about where it is grown and the kind of flavour that one can expect as a result. Some is fair trade, even.
Well here is the latest from Lucky Strike’s strike out campaign that attempts to move the brand to one of taste related to where the tobacco is grown. So, in the middle is the good old USA. Left, Columbia. Right, Brazil.
Surely next is not fair trade tobacco?
Lucky Strike strikes another hit in its strike-through campaign
Back on the streets of Munich roars Lucky Strike with its strike-through cod cleverness. The pointless statement (left) “Einheitsgeschmack” translated as uniform taste (there are three varieties to choose from) is shortened to “Geschmack”, merely taste.
The cigarette machines offer additional opportunities for state-of-the-art advertising (right). “Ich hab meine Zigaretten mehr” translates as I have more cigarettes, becomes one cigarette more (customers get one extra free, seemingly). What an amazing brand!
Spring cigarette advertising campaigns in Germany
Filed under: Cigarette advertising | Tags: Camel, Gauloises, Pall Mall
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Cigarette advertisements in Munich are sprouting like spring flowers. Three brands are slugging it out on the streets, Pall Mall, Camel and Gauloises (making a welcome return to the narrative).
Pall Mall has gone monochrome with a set of posters featuring people who have amazing lives. Seemingly. These two loveable men, according to the caption, as I understand it, have very colourful lives already (hence the monochrome picture). The cigarette seems to help their
masculinity.
There is an equivalent for the women (right). These two sophisticates ask what are we to think of them? Not much. Really.
The French brand, Gauloises, has a similar approach with its ‘Vive le Moment’ campaign. Of course, this involves, like the competitors, living life to the full with cigarettes, a seemingly contradictory idea. Here we have two people having fun in a bath – though the cigarette is unsurprisingly absent. Somehow they have ended up in this situation having missed a flight and checked in to a different hotel. As you do. Both of them seem to have overcome their nicotine addiction and predilection to cancer in favour of sexually transmitted diseases.
There is an exclusively female take on this. Here they use their long tresses to create moustaches. Why would they do this?
Not sure. Maybe they should get to know the hairy men in the Pall Mall ad. Could be a good night of tobacco exchanges. Or not.
And then there is Camel, ‘untamed since 1913’. Colourful. A bit like gravestones. Quite fitting really.
L&M go green. Literally
Not a great picture taken across a railway line at day break, but this poster is the only thing that appears green at the minute in Munich. L&M battle it out across that railway line with Pall Mall and Marlboro. Strapline rather curious: cigarettes for purists and delicious. In a way that asbestos in buildings is for purist architects, no doubt. Tödlich, as they say.
Pall Mall and mature couples
Is this the new Pall Mall couple? The ageing hipster with his oh-so stylish beard. The 30 something woman with perfect teeth and nail-barred fingers wonderfully hosting a newly lit cigarette. And the strapline? Erm…more is not enough for us?
Is death not enough?
Finally some good advice from Marlboro
The Marlboro ‘Maybe’ campaign is back on the streets of Munich and presumably the rest of Germany. Much missed, I have to say. For once, it seems, the statement has something going for it. I am learning myself how to do this consistently. ‘Maybe’ it is a function of age? ‘Maybe’ a function of maturity?
Linking it with cigarette consumption, however, is not quite such a positive. ‘Maybe’ it will just be ignored. ‘Maybe’.
Camel’s spring push
Camel seems to push its brands in January and February in Germany. The brand is sharing the approach of Marlboro, JSP, Pall Mall and others – focus on the brand, two varieties, clean packaging an asinine strapline. In this case, “Camel unplugged” captures that approach coupled with the familiar “Geschmack ohne verstärker” – essentially taste without additives, if my translating skills are in tact.
This campaign is clearly a winner because that august publication, the Cigar Journal, has verified the taste claim having compared 36 similar products. So there you have it. See you in hospital.
New year smoke
There is not much interesting happening on the cigarette advertising front at the moment in Germany. All to report is that JSP has claimed a few vacant advertising hoardings and come up with the amazing offer of “extra for you”. This prompts me to say my usual – extra tar, carcinogenic chemicals, death. Happy new year.
Classic cigarette campaign – logo and strapline
Marlboro has entered the Christmas campaign with some sparsely located posters, this one in Munich. Regular readers will know that Marlboro’s Maybe campaign has generated controversy regarding its juxtaposition of cigarettes and youth/sex. When the criticism has been at its height, Marlboro has kept the “Maybe” and removed the unambiguous images that feed the regulator’s misgivings. And so we are here, the Marlboro box and label are prominent with the unambiguous transferred to the statement 
“100% MAYBE FREE”; in other words, smoking Marlboros ensures against mediocrity, as per other adds in the campaign (for example, never fallen in love, right).
Be informed 