Most Ad Execs Would Restrict Cigarette Ads

Most advertising executives feel that cigarette ads are partly intended to get teens to smoke - and they also support restricting such advertising, an anti-tobacco group said Tuesday.

The findings, to be released formally today, contrast with the tobacco industry’s long-held position that its ads are designed to get adult smokers to switch brands rather than to get people of any age to smoke.

The results of a survey by the Initiative on Tobacco Marketing to Children were obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

The survey was conducted after the federal Food and Drug Administration issued regulations set to take effect next year that would restrict tobacco advertising that could reach youngsters.

For example, the rules would ban tobacco advertising on billboards within 1,000 feet of schools and limit tobacco companies to black-and-white, text-only ads in magazines which have a sizable readership among children.

The tobacco industry and ad trade groups have gone to court to challenge the regulations as an infringement on their ability to market legal products.

But the newly formed anti-tobacco group said it suspects there is widespread support in the advertising industry for limits on tobacco ads, and its survey appears to bear that out.

The group said it surveyed middle to senior level executives at 300 of the nation’s 1,287 agencies handling at least $10 million a year in advertising, including firms with tobacco company accounts.

It said the sampling error in its survey could alter actual results by as much as 5.5 percentage points either way from the reported totals.

It said 68 percent of the respondents felt marketing cigarettes to teens who smoke was a goal of cigarette advertising and 59 percent said a goal was marketing to teen non-smokers. It said 82 percent of those surveyed felt tobacco advertising reaches children and teens in significant numbers.

Seventy-nine percent of those surveyed said they strongly or somewhat favored limiting the style and placement of tobacco advertising to minimize the impact on children and teenagers.