sample="quota" bates="TIMN0219994" isource="ti" decade="1990" class="ui" date="19910730" RADIO TV REPORTS, INC. 4071 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 (301) 656-4068 FOR THE TOBACCO INSTITUTE, INC. PROGRAM Perspective STATION WZZK-AM Radio DATE July 30, 1991 7:00 AM CITY Birmingham, ALA SUBJECT Campaign to Discourage Youth Smoking MELANY BERRY: You're listening to Perspective on WZZK. I'm Melany Berry. Our next guests on this program are representatives of the Tobacco Institute. We will be talking about an advertising campaign aimed at discouraging children and teenagers from smoking. Our guests are Tom Lauria, a spokesman for the Tobacco Institute, and Jolly Ann Davidson, an educational consultant to the Tobacco Institute. First off, thank you both for agreeing to be on the program. JOLLY ANN DAVIDSON [T.I. Educational Consultant]: Thank you, Melany. TOM LAURIA [Tobacco Institute Spokesman]: Nice to be here. BERRY: Tom, we need to establish for our audience up front who the Tobacco Institute is. You represent the people who make cigarettes. LAURIA: And other tobacco products. BERRY: Okay. LAURIA: And as such, we handle their lobbying, public affairs and legal matters in state capitals and in the capital of Washington, DC. BERRY: Okay. So this organization that you're speaking for is funded by the tobacco industry. LAURIA: Exclusively. We -- the Tobacco Institute does not organize smokers rights groups. It is not a manufacturer or marketer of tobacco products. We're the public affairs arm of the industry and, when need be, the lobbying arm. BERRY: Okay. A big PR campaign you have going right now or are launch -- that you're launching is aimed at teenagers. What are you trying to get across? What are you trying to do? LAURIA: Well, we've had a long-standing policy not to develop communications that would encouraged kids to smoke. But recently, in December of 1990, we decided that we need to take a tougher stand than ever. The public concern was as high as it's ever been, and so we decided, after much deliberation, to announce a five-point program that would discourage youth from starting to smoke. We have initiated a retail awareness campaign called "It's the Law." We'll get into that in some detail. That's for people who sell tobacco products. We wants to help them keep cigarettes out of the hands of kids. We have decided to intensify a program that we started back in 1984 to give information to parents on how to discourage their children from smoking and how they can help their children tackle the issue of peer pressure. And with me on the media tour to discuss these issues is Jolly Ann Davidson who can address that in much more detail. But we've also done a few other things. In the marketing area we have voluntarily stopped distributing free public samples -- free samples of cigarette in public, I should say. And we have taken other measures such as producing promotional items only in adult sizes such as baseball caps and T-shirts. We are limiting the location of our billboards, and we are no longer going to pay to have tobacco products in movies. Very often, you know, there's thousands of industries that pay a lot of money to have their products featured in a film. We no longer do that. On the whole, we feel that the measure will inform the public of the industry's serious commitment to discourage youth from smoking. We don't want want these kids for customers. We're satisfied with the market of adults who continue to want our products, and we are as concerned as the next person when we see teenagers smoking when they are -- it's illegal for them to do, and when their parents and others may not very well want them to. BERRY: So what are you going to do to try to discourage teenagers from smoking? LAURIA: Well, right now Jolly Ann and I are on a media tour to let parents and retailers and other members of the public now what is available for free from the Tobacco Institute to help answer these -- their serious concern. LAURIA: I find it ironic that, for example, once again last -- actually last week, the AMA once again called for tobacco companies to stop, for example, sponsoring car races, a perfect example of what we're talking about. The father or mother going to that car race certainly is entitled to buy a beer. That's within their realm as an adult, if that's what they want tot do. They don't want their kids out drinking, but there's a distinction that needs to be made. They don't want their kids driving around at 210 miles an hour in a circle. That's inappropriate. And the children are going to need to perceive that there are -- there is a time and a place for everything, and perhaps they should never exceed the speed limit. We all would hope that they wouldn't or drink before their time, or smoke, if at all, until they're old enough to make that decision for themselves. That's why we make a differentiation because we, as manufacturers of an adult product, perceive that there's a legitimate market and there's an illegal market, and that children obviously are a market that the law says we can't have. That's what we're trying to jettison. And I think that we are responding to a lot of our critics by doing so. We are not trying to ignore the clamor that we're hearing from certain communities. We are trying to ignore the clamor that we're heading from certain communities. We are trying to, the best of our abilities, to address that with sound programs that will work. And the peer pressure program is something that isn't being tried in other quarters. And sometimes we are -- we hear criticism that, well, there's not enough information in our literature about health information. But that's the one thing that children from age three on have plenty of. They can't really get away from that. BERRY: So you're book on saying no, does it have any charts that show a lung blackened by cigarette smoke or..? DAVIDSON: No. And it doesn't because, as Tom said, they have this information and, quite honestly, they need more. The number of teens smoking in the '70s and '80s decreased. Now, the last few years, we've reached a plateau. About 18, 19 percent of teenagers smoke. It isn't because they haven't had the information, because they have, not only from the schools, both public and private, but from the media, from health organizations, there's a fund of information out there. So there has to be some other reason why they continue to smoke. And we feel it's definitely because of peer pressure. We want to get that percentage down as low as possible. BERRY: But it does sound a little bit like your effort does stop short of really criticizing, I mean, the product. And obviously, I mean, you get your money, you're paid by the tobacco industry, and it's the tobacco industry that's lodged this campaign. It sounds like it stops a bit short of really saying how bad cigarettes are, how bad smoking is and so forth. LAURIA: It's impossible to see -- buy a pack of cigarettes or see and ad that doesn't have the counter-message provided by the Surgeon General through the government. I don't think there's a single person listening to this program that isn't aware of the risk factors associated with cigarette smoking in terms of the linkage to lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema and other serious problems. There's a universal awareness of that. What there isn't any universal awareness of is how to cope with pressures that come to bear on children. You're going to be -- you're not going to be very hard pressed to get health information about smoking. You can get it almost anywhere you look. You will be hard pressed to find good reliable tactics to address peer pressure. In a way, you can look at this program as trying to fill in the gaps which will give you, as a parent or as a role model, more equipment than ever to address some of these issues. DAVIDSON: It addresses that, Melany, and you're absolutely right. And it's not only in this part of the country. It's widespread, the use of tobacco among young boys. And so the booklet, the techniques would work equally as well for a parent concerned about that. LAURIA: I should add, as a representative of the tobacco lobby, that we have been successful this year in three states and the District of Columbia in lobbying to raise the minimum age for purchase. in Virginia, in Vermont and in DC, we had minimum ages of 16 and we worked to raise it to the age of 18. And then in Wyoming -- I'll be going there next after Birmingham 00 they had no minimum age for purchase. That -- they now have one of age 18. Now we were unsuccessful in Louisiana, but we'll be back, as we will in New Mexico and Missouri and other places. BERRY: Okay. In those states, did you go in and propose this or did you propose 18 as an alternative to someone else who wanted it to be 21 or never? LAURIA: No. That's supposing a layer of opposition that's not there. We can't -- we don't -- no one can propose legislation except for elected legislators. We work with them. They propose it and we rally what forces we can muster to support -- go on public record of supporting it. BERRY: We've talked mainly about, and that's what we've been scheduled to talk about, your efforts to discourage children and teens from smoking. As you see a tremendous value in discouraging youth from starting a smoking habit or a chewing tobacco habit, do you ever intend, as the tobacco industry, to discourage adults from buying your product because they are dangerous and can lead to death? LAURIA: Then I think people that buy the products are aware of the government's health concerns around it. I don't think that any direct action by the Tobacco Institute is necessary or appropriate. It is, after all, legal around the world. We have enormous overseas markets as well as a strong domestic market. It is shrinking about two to three percentage points a year. We know how to operate in a declining market. Some of the advertising you see are merely brands that are trying to communicate information to smokers in an ever shrinking market and a smaller slice of the pie. That's why cigarette ads often are colorful. They need to get noticed amongst all of the clutter. But it would be inappropriate, I think, for anyone to expect the tobacco industry to tell people who can legally buy their products and are well aware of the Surgeon General's concerns about smoking, that they shouldn't. What we are doing is following society's guidelines that dictate that people under 19, in this state, or 18 in most other states, should not be using your products and it's illegal for them to buy your products. We want -- we respect that and we will help hold the line as society dictates. BERRY: We have just few moments left. Jolly Ann, would you like to take a chance to sort of summarize what you're trying to achieve? DAVIDSON: I'd love to, Melany. Thank you. The booklet "Tobacco: Helping Youth Say No" is a guide for parents to use with their youngsters from elementary age on up, working with them to understand and cope with peer pressure, and giving them techniques to use in helping their youngsters say no to tobacco and a number of other activities that we, as parents, do not want our youngsters involved in. For their free copy, your listeners may write to: The Tobacco Institute, Post Office Box 41130 in Washington, D.C. And the zip code is 20018. BERRY: Thank you both for joining us on the program. LAURIA: It was a pleasure. Thank you for having us. DAVIDSON: Thank you, Melany. BERRY: Tom Lauria is a spokesman for the Tobacco Institute based in Washington. Jolly Ann Davidson is an educational consultant to that same group which is a wing of the tobacco industry in the United States. Thanks for being on Perspective. LAURIA: Thank you. DAVIDSON: Thank you. BERRY: Thanks for joining us on the program. I'm Melany Berry.