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Tobacco companies heat up the nightclub scene
By CHAD GRAHAM © St. Petersburg Times, published August 16, 1998 Everyone is in full weekend mode. Gathered in a corner wearing matching bright red outfits, five Marlboro promotions agents wait for curious patrons to walk over. Tim Collins, a 22-year-old student at the Academy of Merchandising and Design International in Tampa, wanders over and fills out a survey about consumer smoking habits. As a reward for his participation, he gets a black and red Marlboro baseball cap. Collins said he just wanted the free merchandise. He smoked Marlboro Lights for 12 years but stopped this year after his lung collapsed. Still, he said, Marlboro must be onto something with its promotions in bars and dance clubs catering to young adults. "You've got to hear a name 30 times and then you'll buy, that's the key to advertising," he said. "They keep their name out in front of everyone." As Florida lawmakers crack down on cigarette advertising, tobacco companies are showering Tampa Bay area night spots with logo-stamped coasters, napkins and signs. They also provide the clubs free weekly advertising worth hundreds of dollars in alternative publications like the Weekly Planet. It is one of the few ways that cigarette companies can reach young and legal smokers these days. They can assure their critics that they are only targeting those over 21 years of age when they make deals with bars to hand out cigarette samples and apparel or to host games and live bands. Before they get any Marlboro goodies, participants must sign a form and show proof that they are at least 21. They are also are asked to fill out a survey indicating their favorite brand. Perhaps most important, Philip Morris tries to coax them onto its mailing list: Smokers are asked to provide their address to receive promotional items at home. In May, Philip Morris, the world's largest cigarette company, started the Party with Marlboro campaign in nightly hot spots like Ybor City, but the company would not say exactly how many bars had promotional contracts. RJR Tobacco got to the bar scene first, arriving in bay area nightspots in 1996, and its Camel Club now has a presence in 31 bars, according to Carole Crosslin, a company spokeswoman. "Camel has always been a brand involved in urban nightlife and culture," she said. "The program fits with the Camel positioning." Finding a place to advertise cigarettes has gotten tougher since the state settled its $11.3-billion lawsuit against the tobacco industry last year. The settlement removed ads from cigarette billboards, vending machines accessible to children and most sporting events and mass transit systems. Bars may be the cigarette companies' last hope. "It's the only avenue for advertising for the cigarette companies anymore," said Stephen Browning, the general manager of Panini's Bar and Grill in Tampa's Ybor City, which has a contract with Marlboro. Carol Guadagnolo, 23, a bartender at nearby Pleasuredome, said she has worked during two Party with Marlboro nights and has seen customers make a beeline for the booths stocked with apparel. "The one thing that they do is give out free merchandise, and people love that," she said. "People will fill out the survey because they want to get that hat or T-shirt." To succeed in attracting Generation Xers, tobacco companies not only have to give away free merchandise but have to work hard at appearing low-key, said Liz DiPilli, a partner in Project X, a Manhattan consulting firm. "I think it's a very fine line between being overt and trying to remain cool and hip and underground. It's kind of a Gen X razor's edge," she said. "If you're a cigarette company you don't want the 21-to-29-year-olds to have to seek you out, you have to seek them out and do things that are cool." Pleasuredome's promotion was advertised by a couple of small posters and a neon sign in the bar's front corner. That was enough to draw a steady stream of patrons to the Marlboro table. Some bar managers estimated a Marlboro team can survey 300 to 400 patrons in one bar on a busy Saturday night. Marlboro has a similar promotion, Party at the Marlboro Ranch, which is not being used in the Tampa Bay area. Some say the company should be pressing the ranch theme in all its promotions. John Grace, executive director of Interbrand, a New York branding and consulting firm, said Marlboro, which has spent decades building a Western image, may confuse consumers with the bar promotions. "Marlboro always understood it was not selling a product, Marlboro was selling the aspiration to the American West," he said. "It does nothing to build the brand and becomes an expensive promotion that doesn't work." Some longtime smokers at Pleasuredome say a free sample or souvenir won't influence their choice of cigarettes. And some club managers wonder if the promotions are really penetrating Generation X. "I don't see it as viable marketing for Marlboro," said Jeff Ruth, 34, the general manager of The Rubb, also in Ybor City, which has a contract with the cigarettemaker. Holding up an item barely visible in the dimly lit bar, he said, "The only way that my customers are going to know that this is a Marlboro ashtray is if they stick it in their pocket and take it home."
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AMPA -- It's a Friday night in Ybor City, where the twentysomething crowd at Pleasuredome clutch their bottles of beer and dance to the gut-thumping music. Some take long drags from their cigarettes and blow the smoke across the mass of bodies.
