Nonprofit Group Targets Virginia Slims Ads

A nonprofit group in Los Angeles is taking on Philip Morris with ads attacking its Virginia Slims brand. The group, the Women’s Tobacco Coalition, is unveiling today 10 billboards showing an overweight woman holding a cigarette and coughing. The legend says, “The tobacco industry’s concept of beauty is breath-taking. Smoking is not a woman thing.” One will be located near a billboard for Virginia Slims that is adjacent to Manual Arts High School in South-Central Los Angeles. Lagrant Communications manager Lourdes Rodriguez, who created the ad for the coalition, said the message is “smoking isn’t going to make you glamorous or thin.” The campaign is being funded via the Proposition 99 tobacco tax initiative. New York-based Philip Morris had no comment on the ad, but said it believes in freedom of speech, asserting that the coalition and the tobacco company have equal rights to advertise. Tobacco advertising, currently barred from radio and TV, is under government scrutiny.