Companies spend huge sums on TV ads...

Companies spend huge sums on TV ads, sponsorships to boost e-cigarette sales

NEW YORK: Electronic cigarettes may be a creation of the early 21st century, but critics of the devices say manufacturers are increasingly borrowing marketing tactics that are more reminiscent of the heady days of tobacco in the mid-1900s.

With US smokers buying e-cigarettes at a record pace — annual sales are expected to reach $1.7 billion by year's end — e-cigarette makers are opening their wallets wide, spending growing sums on TV commercials with celebrities, catchy slogans and sports sponsorships.

Those tactics can no longer be used to sell tobacco cigarettes, but are readily available to the ecigarette industry because it is not covered by the laws or regulations that affect the tobacco cigarette industry. The e-cigarette industry is also spending lavishly on marketing methods that are also still available to their tobacco brethren, including promotions, events, sample giveaways and print ads.

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E-cigarette advertising could be coming to...

E-cigarette advertising could be coming to television

By Tom De Poto/The Star-Ledger 
on August 27, 2013 at 7:54 AM, updated August 27, 2013 at 7:55 AM

It’s been 52 years since Fred Flintstone lit a Winston cigarette on television, and about 43 years since tobacco advertising was banned from TV altogether. But Reynolds American, the nation’s second largest tobacco company, plans to return to the airwaves with a 60-second televised commercial next month.

The ad won’t feature any of the Flintstones, or Joe Camel or any other cartoon character.
It won’t even feature tobacco. The ad will be for Vuse, the company’s entry into the electronic cigarette market.

R.J. Reynolds Vapor Company, a subsidiary of Reynolds American, has been selling its e-cigarette in Colorado on a trial basis before a national rollout.
The ad will feature lab technicians in white coats, according to Bloomberg.
E-cigarettes are battery-powered plastic or metal tubes containing a liquid nicotine solution that when heated creates vapors a “smoker” can inhale. Users – who prefer to be called vapers -- can get their nicotine without the other harmful chemicals in tobacco filled cigarettes.

Tobacco advertising on television was banned by the federal government in 1971 because of its harmful effects on smokers. But e-cigarettes are not currently regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, which opens the playing field for the new product.

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E-cigs ad blitz goes unregulated

Aug 3, 2013 by Kelly Kaderabek

From News.com.au:

COMPANIES vying for a stake in the fast-growing e-cigs business are reviving the decades-old marketing tactics the tobacco industry used to hook generations of people on regular cigarettes.

They're using cab-top and bus stop displays, sponsoring race cars and events, and encouraging smokers to "rise from the ashes'' and take back their freedom in slick TV commercials featuring celebrities like TV personality Jenny McCarthy.

The Food and Drug Administration plans to set marketing and product regulations for electronic cigarettes in the near future. But for now, almost anything goes.

"Right now it's the wild, wild west,'' Mitch Zeller, director of the FDA's Center for Tobacco Products, said in a recent interview with The Associated Press.

Electronic cigarettes are battery-powered devices made of plastic or metal that heat a liquid nicotine solution, creating vapor that users inhale. Users get their nicotine without the thousands of chemicals, tar or odor of regular cigarettes. And they get to hold something shaped like a cigarette, while puffing and exhaling something that looks like smoke.

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Tobacco Giant Jumps on TV Ad Opportunity for New, Unregulated E-Cigarettes

Jun 8, 2013 by Kelly Kaderabek of SpinFuel

While tobacco ads have been banned from TV since 1971, the FDA has yet to ban ads for the industry's latest innovation, electronic cigarettes. With that, R.J. Reynolds, the parent of Camel and the brand behind Vuse e-cigarettes is taking advantage of the lack of oversight and advertising what the company claims will be a “game changer," AdAge reports.

At the start, the ads will only appear in Colorado, but the plan is for an eventual national rollout. The campaign will also include print and direct-mail marketing. However, things could change if the FDA announces that it intends to regulate e-cigarettes. Reynolds American CEO Daniel Delen said he believes such an announcement could be “imminent."

Since the Vuse experience is designed to be one that closely mirrors the action of traditional smoking, the target audience, the publication notes, are smokers who have wanted to transition to e-cigarettes. According to AdAge, “more than 40 percent of smokers have tried e-cigarettes, but approximately 80 percent go back to exclusively smoking traditional cigarettes.”