Visual Culture

Pentagram takes on tobacco.

This month the Senate approved new legislation that will heavily restrict the nicotine content and marketing of cigarettes, including the requirement that colorful ads and displays be replaced with black-and-white-only text. The bill is expected to pass in the House and President Obama has said he will sign it. For a piece in its Sunday Perspectives section, the St. Petersburg Times asked DJ Stout what cigarette companies might do to follow the new marketing rules. (The full article is print only; we’ve posted it here.) Stout suggests that to comply with the new crackdown, cigarette manufacturers like Marlboro should embrace the restrictions and make cigarettes look truly dangerous. This, of course, will still appeal to a core group of smokers.

“Over the years there has been an onslaught of public awareness messaging about the evils of smoking,” says Stout. “Unless you’ve been living in a cave for the last 50 years you are very aware that smoking is not only bad for you, it could very likely kill you. All smokers know this for sure but it doesn’t deter them.

“Our marketing advice to cigarette companies in the new heavily regulated era is to fully accept the new aggressive anti-smoking restrictions and wallow in the government’s apocalyptic health warnings. Don’t make excuses or dance around the stepped-up marketing regulations, just transform the whole cigarette pack into a three dimensional warning label.”