Relax With a Camel

We all at one point

have followed a trend or have

succumbed to the pressures of

following a trend. Trends

come and go, as well as methods on how to advertise products to different groups of

people. Either the ad campaigns change their techniques of advertising to people, or

change their product to follow the latest trend. In an interview with Clotaire Rapaille

he states that “we [as] Americans, we like to have choices: My own life, I want to

become whatever I am; whatever it is doesn’t matter, but I want to become myself—

not something else, not what people tell me” and that is true, even some companies

have noticed so that could be a reason why they come up with different products to

suit our needs. But yet we at times believe that we need something because of the

way that it is advertised to us and we go out and buy it even though we might not

need it. Take a look at Camel cigarettes as an example.

Men have been the focus in the ads

throughout the decades. If we go to the nineteen

thirties we can see that they used men in sports as a way to

advertise the cigarettes as a stimulant proclaiming that they gave

them energy. If we go one decade ahead into the nineteen

forties we see the Camel cigarette ads had begun to

get patriotic during World War II. The way they advertised the cigarettes then, is by proclaiming

that the marines, navy and army men preferred Camel cigarettes. You would want to support your

country, wouldn’t you? While America was entering World War II the ads switched its theme to

patriotism. They began to tell a story of families sending their sons, fathers, and even husbands

packs of Camel cigarettes as a way to show that they supported them during the war.

In one ad it said “It’s the most welcome gift you can send

him…a carton of Camels- the soldier’s favorite”. Under

that statement it showed four marines reading a letter and

receiving the pack of cigarettes with a smile on his face.

It was a good technique used by the company to advertise their

product according to what was going on in the world as well as suggesting that they made the

soldiers happy. In the nineteen fifties they began to use actors to promote Camel cigarettes.

Some of the men in these ads included Robert Young, Rick Hudson,

Tony Curtis, and Phil Silvers. John Wayne and Brian Keith whom

also starred in Camel ads later died from lung and stomach cancer,

and emphysema. In the seventies the “Camel Man” appears,

“Camels finally decides maybe it’s not the filter, as much as the

tough guy image. So they introduce their own ‘Camel Man’. In every ad, a different woman

is staring at him.” Sadly the “Camel Man” didn’t stick around for too long and in the early

nineteen eighties a new man appears and they cut out woman from the advertisements and a

new slogan appears “It’s a whole new world”, and “Where a Man Belongs”.

Although men

have been the focus in the Camel ads

they have faded in and out of them.

There has also been another

person that has contributed to the

message that the Camel’s cigarette ads have tried to express. When the men in the ads

were the biggest picture the reader could see there has been an attractive woman in the

back ground to suggest that all eyes would be on the

man that smokes Camel cigarettes. “By the end

of decade [1920], Camel is pursuing young

female customers. They suggest that in

between their tea parties and gold, classy rich

women would appreciate Camel Cigarettes.”

Camel cigarettes began to advertise women

who showed class and sophistication by putting

drawings of charming women.

Men and women are not the only targets of advertisements. Every ad campaign tries

new things so they can attract different audiences like trying to target younger people to

begin smoking at a younger age, or at least that’s how it’s interpreted.

Pediatricians had conducted a survey with teens

throughout four years. According to John Bonifield a CNN

Medical Producer, “in [a] study, girls were asked over the course of

several years, ‘What is the name of the cigarette brand of your favorite cigarette

advertisement?’ In 2004, 10 percent of girls chose Camel as their favorite brand. In 2008, a

year after R.J. Reynolds launched its new campaign, nearly 22 percent of girls chose Camel

as their favorite brand.” Although this ad was “featured in popular women’s magazines like

Glamour, Lucky and Vogue back in 2007”, some people believed that it was

targeting teenage girls because “the

cigarettes are featured right alongside a

beautiful dress, shoes, jewelry, and a

purse- the kinds of items that you might

expect teen girls to find glamorous and appealing.” Although it seems that the ad was

targeting teenage girls, “the company’s statement goes on to say, ‘Camel No. 9 was

developed in response to female adult smokers… who were asking for a product that better

reflected their taste preferences and style.’” In the late 1980’s Camel cigarettes tried a new

way to advertise their product, but was it a good move for the company? Some people

believed that their new tactic of using Camel Joe to advertise their cigarettes was a bad

move because it also appealed to younger children.

When they first began to introduce new ideas about Camel cigarettes(1934),

the company was stating that the cigarettes gave

people energy and helped people get through the day.

The ads began to feature people doing sports and

being active to prove their point. Later in the 1950’s

they began to say that they helped people relax.

The company came up with the slogan that was

found in every ad “No other cigarette so rich-tasting yet

so mild as camel”, and had their models lean back as to show how relaxing smoking a camel

would make you.

As decades came and went the focus of the ads changed drastically; from

advertising to men and making it a manly cigarette to making women the focus and having

them advertise the sophistication and class that a Camel cigarette gave a woman. What’s

really intriguing is the statement that the cigarettes would give a person energy and then a

decade later proclaim something totally different- that it was a downer and relaxed a person.

Surprisingly I found an article almost stating the exact same thing that an ad from the 1940’s

stated, “Smokers often say that lighting up a cigarette can calm their nerves, satisfy their

cravings, and help them feel energized.” In a survey found in “The Psychology of Everyday

Living” by Ernest Dichter “there are several reasons why a person feels good when

smoking a cigarette, among one of them is the reeling of being relaxed.

It has nothing with a substance in the cigarette alone, it’s just stated that some people just

feel relaxed because it’s an effortless activity to just sit back and relax while they watch the

smoke be released from their nostrils or mouth.” According to GumAuctions.com it stated

that “for those born prior to the passage of the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act in 1970,

there was an overwhelming amount of false information [such as] ads implied smoking

could make one more attractive or wealthy, advertisements promoted the health

benefits of smoking, physicians even touted

the health benefits of smoking, [and] family

and friends encouraging smoking.” There

are different reasons for teens though, “in

teens, peer pressure is generally the major factor in

starting to smoke. Anecdotes from friends or esteemed peers can counteract their

knowledge of the damage smoking can do. Some things teens thing about when deciding to

smoke are: it looks cool- an image perpetuated by cigarette use in pop culture, it will keep

you from eating and help you lose weight, cigarettes will help you think and make

homework easier, smoking helps you relax, [and] they don’t know anyone who has died

from smoking.”

Cigarette companies have been targeting many people to get them to buy

their product. In the book Brave New World Revisited it states “Hyde is a motivation

analyst, and his business is to study human weaknesses and failings, to investigate those

unconscious desires and fears by which so much of men’s conscious thinking and overt

doing is determined.

And he does this, not in the spirit of the moralist who would like to make people better, or

of the physician who would like to improve their health, but simply in order to find out the

best way to take advantage of their ignorance and to exploit their irrationality for the

pecuniary benefit of his employers. But after all, it may be argued, “capitalism is dead,

consumerism is king”- and consumerism requires the service of expert salesman versed in

all the arts (including the more insidious arts) of persuasion” (278). They get us hooked with

the additives in the tobacco and makes us unable to stop smoking and making it addictive.

Although they have stated that they don’t target young children they make it hard for is to

see that because the ads have gave us results that they do and that it’s working.