IN 1946, THE RJ REYNOLDS Tobacco Company initiated a major new advertising campaign for Camels, one of the most popular brands in the United States. Working to establish dominance in a highly competitive market, Reynolds centered their new campaign on the memorable slogan, “More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.” This phrase would be the mainstay of their advertising for the next 6 years. Touting surveys conducted by “three leading independent research organizations,” one typical advertisement proclaimed that according to “nationwide” surveys of 113597 doctors “from every branch of medicine,” Camel was the brand smoked by most respondents. It also asserted that this statistic was an “actual fact,” not a “casual claim.” In reality, this “independent” surveying was conducted by RJ Reynolds’s advertising agency, the William Esty Company, whose employees questioned physicians about their smoking habits at medical conferences and in their offices. It appears that most doctors were surveyed about their cigarette brand of choice just after being provided complimentary cartons of Camels.1 Even without the suspect nature of the data used in the “More Doctors” campaign, the frequent appearance of physicians in advertisements for cigarettes in this and many other ad campaigns is both striking and ironic from the vantage point of the early 21st century. Any association between physicians and cigarettes-the leading cause of death in the United States-is jarring given our current scientific knowledge about the relationship of smoking to disease and the fact that fewer than 4% of physicians in the United States now smoke. Per: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1470496/
I was thinking about this too. The difference is, people don't read books or the newspaper or older distraction nearly as much as people spend time on the phone today. One could argue that the phone has replaced different forms of entertainment with a single device. I guess it's worth adding reducing screen time to the list of new year resolutions and find out if it makes a difference this year. 😀
I believe it'd be much less common to catch people reading books while crossing the street outside, or while their child is trying to get their attention. Reading a book is very much a deliberate choice, whilst phones can be linked to distractions of work, etc.
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Sam harris ♡
ah I totally get it now. I was wondering why it was putting me to sleep lol
This is great stuff 💜
Another brilliant piece as always .. ❤️
Why did doctors smoke camels more than any other cigarettes though, does anyone have a clue?
IN 1946, THE RJ REYNOLDS Tobacco Company initiated a major new advertising campaign for Camels, one of the most popular brands in the United States. Working to establish dominance in a highly competitive market, Reynolds centered their new campaign on the memorable slogan, “More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.” This phrase would be the mainstay of their advertising for the next 6 years. Touting surveys conducted by “three leading independent research organizations,” one typical advertisement proclaimed that according to “nationwide” surveys of 113597 doctors “from every branch of medicine,” Camel was the brand smoked by most respondents. It also asserted that this statistic was an “actual fact,” not a “casual claim.”
In reality, this “independent” surveying was conducted by RJ Reynolds’s advertising agency, the William Esty Company, whose employees questioned physicians about their smoking habits at medical conferences and in their offices. It appears that most doctors were surveyed about their cigarette brand of choice just after being provided complimentary cartons of Camels.1
Even without the suspect nature of the data used in the “More Doctors” campaign, the frequent appearance of physicians in advertisements for cigarettes in this and many other ad campaigns is both striking and ironic from the vantage point of the early 21st century. Any association between physicians and cigarettes-the leading cause of death in the United States-is jarring given our current scientific knowledge about the relationship of smoking to disease and the fact that fewer than 4% of physicians in the United States now smoke. Per: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1470496/
5:28 won't you have the exact same result if they were photographed reading books?
I was thinking about this too. The difference is, people don't read books or the newspaper or older distraction nearly as much as people spend time on the phone today. One could argue that the phone has replaced different forms of entertainment with a single device. I guess it's worth adding reducing screen time to the list of new year resolutions and find out if it makes a difference this year. 😀
I believe it'd be much less common to catch people reading books while crossing the street outside, or while their child is trying to get their attention. Reading a book is very much a deliberate choice, whilst phones can be linked to distractions of work, etc.