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Actually a little story about the state of the UK before I continue. A few years ago this town had to be all but sealed off because of serious gas leaks. The gas pipes have corroded all over the town and every so often the ground finally gives up the unequal struggle of keeping the gas below the surface. Nothing is ever really done, it is patched up.
..a lot of the Rolling Stones mannerisms were down to those jeans.However the health and safety officer was much exercised by the fact I did not have a full medical kit in the shop a few weeks later. All manner of laws were being broken there.
That and the fact I did not have my name displayed in the shop. I improved relations no end by using a sticking plaster to write my name on it and stick it on the till, necessity is the mother of invention.
I was not best pleased but if the town had gone up in an immense fireball I would have felt pretty guilty if I had not been able to stick someones leg back on because I had run out of sticking plasters.
Cigarette cards were a very major feature of advertising for cigarette sales, or at least a method of keeping customers loyal to a particular brand. There would be advertising in the tobacconists informing the smoking public that a particular brand of cigarettes now had a different set of cards in them but it was not the only method of advertising used.
Afterall a lot of cigarette cards were issued on a similar theme, you had to be a real football fan to swap to a cigarette you hated just because there was a set of footballing cigarette cards to be collected.
So plenty of pennies were spent persuading people. Before I break into a chorus of 'Satisfaction', I'm already strutting about in alarmingly tight jeans and clapping my hands in a rather stilted manner. I suspect a lot of the Rolling Stones mannerisms were down to those jeans. Like trying to walk in shoes two sizes to small.
The 1930's was a period of intense competition for the cigarette giants with coupon brands taking large quantities of market share so the advertising copy had to be pretty convincing, 'Smoking Kills' would not really have cut the mustard so J Wix & Sons took a different approach in 1933 when it announced, '1,400 British doctors have stated Kensitas to be less irritating to the throat.'
So there you have it, cigarette advertising keen to be associated with doctors and a reduction of smoking symptoms if only you smoked the correct brand.
No mention of what the cigarettes were being compared to, swallowing razor blades perhaps. My doctor used to smoke like a chimney, he has given up now due to death, it was the drinking that killed him, although it might have been the drug habit.
It never stopped him being the best doctor I have ever had however. This despite the fact he was always smoking and always had a drink in his hand.
It took Pattreouiex with Senior Service a few years to beat that. They did however with a certificate from the Institute of Hygiene which was put into each packet. It seems it was awarded for the fact the tobacco used did not have any foreign substance in it.
That is how much things have changed, not having rat droppings in the stuff was cause for celebration.
However they were not just content with that so added the slogan, 'The Product of the Master Mind.' I am sure that helped sales no end. For a modern day equivalent check out some of those award pages you get on websites.
This was not the first venture into total nonsense Carreras had the slogan, 'aged in the wood for at least three years' on the Turf coupons. And there's more 'rich in flavour as old wine'. Good grief, more like tasted of old wood.
Ogdens also thought there was a virtue in ageing. In every No 6 tobacco there was a slip, 'not a tin is sold till it is at least six months old.' Our local newsagents is a bit like that, Woodbines from them live up to the name.
Kensitas were obviously not letting all this pass them by and came out with the slogan, 'Kensitas is the finest cigarette you ever smoked.' Something of a playground ploy that one. No doubt there is a coupon somewhere saying '..the best cigarette you can think of plus a bit.'
As we are all painfully aware for every good slogan there are many failures. Kensitas decided it would give away Austin cars as prizes for the best advertising slogans submitted in a competition but they did stress these had to be based on 'truthfulness', which seems to suggest they actually believed some of the ridiculous claims they made.
It does not matter if you light the wrong end.Drapkins effort of 'Fewer coupons...with Laurel Cigarettes' probably helped sales no end in the coupon wars. Bit like saying 'smaller' instead of bitesize.
Black Cat managed to shoot themselves in the foot when in the early 1930's they suddenly announced 'for twenty-seven years our policy has been value to the public.' Quite what they were doing in the period 1788 to 1908 is open to conjecture.
Nowadays this is not so unusual. How many soap-powder ads claim to be better than the junk they were peddling six months earlier.
Ardath's copywriters struggled to explain the tipped cigarette brand State Express 333 so gave up the ghost really and just said of the reinforced end, 'It does not matter if you light the wrong end.'
They were not the only manufacturer wondering what to say about filter tips, Wills decided to sell a cigarette by claiming it was 'firmly filled with a filter' so hopefully it did not matter what end you started from.
Another Wills effort warned smokers not to smoke beyond the blue line during the 1950's. Quite what happened beyond that point is unknown but perhaps it was a contributory factor to non-smoking cinema's.
Carreras failed to take the advice, 'if you are in a hole stop digging' when they followed up the years of value campaign with extolled the virtue of employment status, 'a staff who are paid good wages.' Gratifying to know and perhaps more relevant today than then.
Churchmans took a different tack when they advertised the virtues of nothing less than the tobacco paper. Using Aquafuge paper had many benefits not least of which was, 'smoking qualities..not in the least impaired by...contact with wet grass.'
No doubt a unique selling point but the question why? Springs naturally to mind.Once you notice it you just cannot stop.
All this advertising just underlines the fact the tobacco companies were very fortunate cigarettes are addictive.