PTE SST – Cigarette Package
Over the past few months, the government has been pushing to remove all advertising outlets for the tobacco industry, and in particular pushing for plain packaging. The tobacco industry, however, are against this and they in particular argue that the cigarette box is not a form of advertising. Michaela has been doing her PhD looking at cigarette advertising and how it’s changed over the last 50 years. Basically, I’ve accessed advertising from the tobacco industry since the 1950s and just analyze the images and looked at the use of the cigarette box within the adverts. In the very early adverts, the cigarette box is a very small part of the adverts and they focus much more on the social aspects of smoking. However, as you move through the decades and get closer to the present day, the cigarette box became more and more of a focal point in the adverts. My argument is that the cigarette box has actually become iconic to each brand. So when a smoker takes a box out of their pocket, they are actually advertising that brand. So what we hope will come out of this is that the government will introduce plain packaging. And like Australia who have already introduced its policy and Ireland who are again beginning to introduce its policy, we hope that the UK will stop cigarette companies from using their box as a form of advertising.