In 1976, Canadian tobacco companies began introducing so-called ‘light’ or ‘mild’ brands. Heavy advertising attracted consumers with promises of full “taste” or “satisfaction” with “low tar”. The industry’s marketing intent was clear: these new brands were pitched at smokers who were worried about the damage cigarettes were doing to their health, but who were too addicted to quit. In 1984, Bob Bexon (now Imperial Tobacco’s CEO) explained the situation to an internal industry conference as follows:
It is useful to consider lights more as a third alternative to quitting and cutting down — a branded hybrid of smokers’ unsucessful attempts to modify their own habit on their own.
In less than a decade, these brands captured 40% of the Canadian market, and now account for more than half of all cigarettes sold in this country.
Unfortunately, as the public health community discovered in the 1980s and 1990s, “light” and “mild” cigarettes are not the panacea some consumers believe:
- By providing false security to some smokers who might otherwise have succeeded in quitting, they have clearly slowed the decline in smoking rates and hence contributed to the 45,000 annual tobacco death toll in Canada.
- Smokers who switch from ‘regular’ to ‘light’ cigarettes often do not reduce their exposure to tar, because of a problem called compensation. Even for individual smokers who would not have succeeded in quitting anyway, there is little evidence of any decreased risk from switching cigarette brands. (See short bibliography on health impact of switching to ‘lower-tar’ cigarettes.)
Consumers expect the term “light” to mean something: by law, “light” beer must be below a certain percentage in alcohol, and “light” margarine must have appreciably fewer calories. In the case of cigarettes, however, the term “light” is completely unregulated. Companies use the term as they see fit to refer loosely to how much ‘tar’ a machine is exposed to when it smokes the cigarette. Unfortunately, human beings do not smoke like machines, and smokers are routinely exposed to far more ‘tar’ than machine smokers — particularly when they are smoking light cigarettes.
Because of all of these concerns, Brazil (see Text of Brazilian regulation [Portuguese]) and the European Union (see Press release, Text of directive) have moved to ban the descriptors “light” and “mild” from all tobacco products. A recently released World Health Organization report recommends all countries take the same step. (See: Advancing Knowledge on Regulating Tobacco Products, p. 96.)
The documents below, many of them from previously secret tobacco industry archives, explain in more detail why “light” and “mild” are highly misleading descriptors when used on cigarettes — descriptors that contribute to thousands of deaths every year.
Document & Source | Description | Key quotes |
Background documents | ||
Background: Light and Mild Cigarettes
From: Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada |
Information-packed fact sheet on “light” and “mild” |
|
Compensation: What is it, and when did the tobacco industry know about it?
From: Non-Smokers’ Rights Association. |
Brief overview of why smokers of ‘light’ cigarettes get much more than they bargain for — and of just how soon the industry realized it. |
|
Limitations to potential uses for data based on the machine smoking of cigarettes: cigarette smoke contents
From: Academic article, based on research sponsored by Health Canada |
Research published in 1986 by Bill Rickert and colleagues showed consumers mistakenly believe switching to ‘light’ cigarettes substantially decreases their exposure to tar. |
|
Smokers’ Beliefs about ‘Light’ Cigarettes
From: Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada |
A compilation of 1999 data from Health Canada’s Canadian Tobacco Use Monitoring Survey. |
|
Overview of the ‘lights’ issue From: Report to Health Canada by Bill Howard, 2000, obtained under Access to Information by Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada |
A comprehensive literature review on the issue, compiled by a former official from the New Brunswick Department of Health. |
|
Industry documents (chronological order) | ||
Advertisement for Player’s Light, 1976
From: Guildford depository |
A typical “best of both worlds” ad from the early days of “light” cigarettes |
|
Response of the market and of Imperial Tobacco to the smoking and health environment, 1978 [?]
|
A think piece about the marketing opportunities offered by “light” cigarettes |
|
“Banding” and “Numbers”, 1981
From: BAT document, from Guildford depository |
This strategy document from BAT headquarters encourages companies to get governments to define the terms “middle tar,” “low tar”, “super low tar”, etc.
This “banding” can then be turned to marketing advantage. |
|
Obstacles/Enemies of a swing to low tar, 1982
|
British-American Tobacco, the parent company of Imperial Tobacco Ltd. of Canada, strategizes on the shift to ‘lights.’ |
|
Project Eli, Spring, 1982
From: TPCA proceedings |
In the early 1980s, marketing consultants working for Imperial Tobacco conducted extensive focus groups with smokers of “light” cigarettes. |
|
Project Eli: Focus Groups — Final Report, 1982
From: TPCA proceedings |
Further research on the meaning of “light” brands, and strategic conclusions for Imperial Tobacco’s marketing efforts. |
|
Paper 6: New Brand Development, Post-Lights, 1984
From: Guildford depository |
Bob Bexon, now the CEO of Imperial Tobacco, presented this stunningly cynical paper at BAT’s 1984 Smoking Behaviour & Marketing Conference. |
|
Player’s 1988 — Performance Highlights versus Specific Measures From: TPCA proceedings |
An update on consumer perceptions of different brands in the Player’s brand family. |
|
The Canadian Tobacco Market at a Glance, 1989 From: TPCA proceedings |
Industry tracking data on awareness of health risks, intent to quit, rates of successful quitting and shift to “light” or “mild” brands.” | Intend to quit (1989): 49%
Actual quitting (1989): 1.8% |
Letter from Don Brown (CEO of Imperial Tobacco) to Ulrich Herter (BAT Managing Director, Tobacco), 1993 From: Guildford depository |
An amusing letter in which Imperial Tobacco explains to headquarters that terms such as “light” are essentially meaningless in Canada. |
|
CEC Key Issue Paper, 1994
From: Guildford depository |
This briefing paper comes from the very top of the BAT corporate hierarchy, and describes how the multinational plans to gain market share among “young adult [urban] smokers” (YAS or YAUS — an industry code word for teens). |
Note: BAT may already have reached its objective in Canada. Recent polling data for Health Canada indicates almost as many youth smokers smoke “lights” brands as “regular” brands. |